KonoSuba: Blessings not Included
by falconpilot
Summary: Instead of being sent to a world with fantasy and magic, Kazuma gets sent into a world closer to ours, but with a lot more bullets and explosions. What could possibly go wrong?
1. Game Start

**Note: This was partially inspired by the Island Life mod in the Arma series (Which is sort of GTA in a more military environment). It's also been a while since I've written anything on this account (and my first time handling a KonoSuba type of storyline), so bear with me as my writing can be quite rusty (feel free to review, flame, etc).**

**I've also made Kazuma act more 'normal' in this fic, as he knows that he's in a more 'real-world' environment than he was in the original KonoSuba universe, and so that it would fit the story better. Other characters will be tweaked a bit as well to fit into this alternate universe but I'll try to keep as much of the original universe quirkiness as much as I can.**

**Also, standard disclaimers apply: I do not own KonoSuba, Arma or the Island Life mod, so you can't arrest me an sell my organs for the upcoming lawsuit**

* * *

"Satou Kazuma-san. Unfortunately, you have just passed away moments ago, and you are now in the afterlife." A female voice said in a calm manner.

The last moments for Kazuma was rather strange. He just remembered a girl, a truck and falling over. He felt pain and that was the end of it, with a weird sensation of ascending towards somewhere else.

Feeling himself, he determined that he was sitting in a chair, wearing a white t-shirt and khaki shorts, reminiscent of his clothing just moments before his 'ascension'. But the weird part would be the room he was in, a seemingly infinite void of stars and space floating around his view in a seemingly ideal mirage of the night sky with a checkered floor of the immediate vicinity.

Yet what stood out the most was directly in front of him: A girl sitting on a throne. While he could get on about appearances and such, the short story would be that she had the beauty to put the idols and models on earth to shame. Her outfit, figure, facial features and hair were all flawless, fitting that of royalty or those beauty magazines. What stood out was the blue- her hair, outfit and eyes were all different shades of it, yet none of it seemed out of place, unlike some poorly done cosplayers Kazuma remembered.

"So, I'm dead, huh?" the young man asked.

"Yes"

He chuckled. While he felt like he should be distressed about his death, some surreal part about it made him think that he could care less. Sure, he was gone in his world, and his parents were probably distraught about his passing and such. Yet he was indirectly happy about it- he had just finished high school, and was in the middle of a sump, being torn on the decision of continuing his education into the postsecondary for the hopes of a better future, or just headed to work straight away. As such, most of his days leading up was spent gaming with friends until morning, or just toiling around in manga and fiction without much to do either way hoping for that motivation spark to light up.

"So this is it, huh? Waiting here, being passed for judgement before being sent to heaven or hell-"

"That's where you're wrong," the girl remarked, standing up from her throne, "I am Aqua, goddess of water. I am here to help people like you who have passed away at an early age onto the next phase."

"Next phase?" Kazuma thought out loud.

"Basically you could be sent to heaven, or be re-born," Aqua explained, "But don't think that heaven is some desirable place to be. You just bask in the sun all day like an old man, without anything to do- there's nothing sexual there either, considering how you don't even have a body."

'That sounds more like hell than heaven to me,' Kazuma thought in disgust. While he was never one to have many friends or excessive ambitions (even sexual for that matter), doing absolutely nothing for all of eternity was definitely going to be a big no in his books.

"And if I'm re-born there's no guarantee that I'll be in a better position right?"

"Um-hm," Aqua nodded.

'So basically a huge gamble of uncertain odds, and starting over?'

"There is a third option," Aqua remarked.

"Huh?"

"You play games, right?" The goddess asked.

"Yes" Kazuma remarked. He had been gaming with his few friends in highschool and online friends in online RPGs or just open world games quite frequently after graduation, up until his untimely demise.

"And you like adventures, right?"

"…sure," the boy nodded slowly. Either way, he's clear with the fact that he's not going with the other options.

"Well you're in luck," Aqua remarked, and a light shone down from above her "There's a world that's not unlike your own that needs saving. It has been ravaged by war and unrest for over half a decade, and its citizens are living in fear and despair! You'll be sent down there with all of your previous world knowledge, so its like packing up and starting a new life!"

"So basically you're just sending people out to have a painful death somewhere down the line again," Kazuma deadpanned.

"Not quite," Aqua corrected, the spotlight above her going out, "You will be granted one power, or item of your choosing to help you with your journey."

At this, Aqua leaned against Kazuma and whispered in his ear, "Keep in mind that the powers may not work in the sense you're expecting fantasy magic. This is closer to the real world, after all."

And with that, the goddess tossed the boy a pack of cards as she got back to her seat.

"Wait, what about the languages of this new world? How would I know how to communicate?"

"Don't worry too much about that, we're gods and we can just cram all the necessary knowledge into your head before we send you down there," Aqua explained, pulling out her handbook from the table next to her throne, "Sure there's a chance that you just get vaporized, but don't worry about that stuff, it's rare."

"Vaporized?" Kazuma asked with concern.

"I said nothing," Aqua stated as she closed the handbook.

Kazuma sighed. She really wasn't going to make this easy for him, was she?

-break-

"Neh, hurry up and pick something," Aqua complained, snacking away on a bag of potato chips, "They're all the same, only basic god powers at the very most. I still have other humans to guide"

Kazuma was not sure which one to pick, as all of them seemed to be useful, just in different ways. Sure there were some utterly gamebreaking ones in there like infinite money or some ridiculously overpowered weapon, but he was always in fear of inadvertently causing something to go wrong down the line (Such as the infinite money cheat warning about 'Total Economic Collapse', or a cheat weapon warning of the possibility of it being captured by the enemy). All of them were fairly generic however, either involving some combat ability, knowledge boost, or some random ability, but nothing 'godly' or magical.

'Should probably go with a skill, and a fairly universal one at that', Kazuma thought, shuffling through the cards laid out on the floor, "Wait, what's this?"

'Engineer'

"What does this do?" He asked, holding up the card in question. It seemed to fit his criteria, if his imagination served him correctly of what engineers do in games and such.

"Ah, that boring one," Aqua waved off, "It's basically a large boost to technical knowledge, intelligence and intuition. Not too frequently picked, as it has no direct effects on combat power. Think of the Engineer from Team Fortress or something"

'It appears that the recently dead here are quite ham fisted'

"Well, grant me those abilities then," Kazuma stated, holding up the card. He was always an advocate of 'building up' before switching over to combat power, especially in strategy games.

"Consider it done," Aqua stated, snapping her fingers, "Please stand in the middle of the portal."

Kazuma complied. A blue light started to shine below him, before he started to feel weightless and started to rise.

A short moment later, he noticed that a similar portal had started to form beneath Aqua as well. Kazuma was perplexed by this, but something tells him that this was not going to end well

"H-hey, what's going on?" Aqua said panicked, "Surely this isn't some sort of a mistake? Let me down!"

"Aqua-senpai, I shall be taking over your position from now on," a third voice said.

In a golden portal and shower of sparks, a third figure descended onto the checkered floor. She appeared to be more petite than Aqua was, with blonde hair and angel wings. Despite the initial awe, Kazuma indirectly thought that the concept of angels (or at least whatever she was called) looked absolutely ridiculous in the mash up of common folklore and just blatantly unaesthetic.

"You've got to be kidding! This can't be right!" Aqua quipped as she started to rise as well.

"Heaven has determined that your management of this world has led to a sharp decline of revivals," the 'angel' explained, "Which has led to the overcrowding of other worlds under our management."

'So there are multiple universes in parallel to just shovel people around in,' Kazuma thought with amusement.

"As for you, brave adventurer," the angel turned towards Kazuma, "Should your quest to bring stability and peace to this world succeed, the gods shall grant you the power of any one wish in return!"

Kazuma's eyes widened at the terms, "Woah, really?"

"That's my line!" Aqua quipped

"Please have a safe trip, Aqua-sama!" the angel returned her attention to Aqua, "We shall send someone to pick you up should you manage to rectify the situation in this world… Also given the lack of magic in the world, you won't have any powers for the duration of your journey."

"That's not fair! I don't even have any offensive spells to boot!" Aqua wailed, waving frantically towards the angel, "Besides, I'm the most senior one in charge here! You can't just replace me like that right off the bat! Please, wait!"

"Best of luck, fellow adventurers! May you be the ones that will restore peace to this wonderful world!"

With that, a portal of light opened above both of the respective adventurers. The world got brighter and brighter for Kazuma until it went completely white, being blurred in with the cries of a goddess being forcibly thrown into the blender against her will.

-break-

Kazuma found himself outside.

It caught him off guard, and he nearly fell over. One second he was floating upwards and his world pitched to black, while the next moment he was outside standing in a field of grass. It was a clear day with few clouds, and the atmosphere felt cleaner as well.

Patting himself down, he determined that he had the same set of clothes he possessed beforehand, except items like his cellphone and wallet was gone. However, he felt an extra bundle in his left pocket within his shorts, which turned out to be a note and a bundle of what appears to be currency for his current world.

'Please head to the town hall to complete your registration as a citizen of this world. There should be a bundle of currency with this message as well.

PS: The Chernarussian Krona has the exchange rate of roughly five yen each'

'Krona? Isn't that Czech?' Kazuma thought, remembering a travel guide of Europe he once flipped through. The bricked two storey buildings and wooden houses seemed to reinforce the idea, yet there were concrete apartment blocks further in the background, similar to what he was used to see in Japan. They appeared to be in a fairly small patch of grass in the center of town, with a T-34 tank and red star monument just in front of them, suggesting that this was a communist (or ex-communist) country. There were a few parked cars on the streets, a few of which he could recognize, but most of them he thought looked like they were straight out of an eighties movie in their body shape or just how straight up worn out they were.

Then he noticed the sobbing. It sounded like an ever familiar goddess that he just met a few short moments ago, which he just reminded himself was sent down to this world with him by the higher ups as some form of punishment for her deeds. She was hunched over just behind him, crying herself out at her predicament without care. Her goddess outfit has also been replaced with a more casual black skirt and white dress shirt, while her boots was replaced with a pair of slip on shoes and black knee socks. She still looked pretty, just more 'human' in the sense now.

'Her hair seems unchanged, oddly enough…' Kazuma noted.

Seeing her like this made Kazuma want to help her out, as he felt it was against his humanity to just leave her there. Additionally she might still have something useful to offer even without her divine powers (it was a whole new world to Kazuma after all, plus she sent people here before him), but honestly he had no idea what to do to get her on the way. Social interactions were never a strong point for the young man

"Um…" Kazuma started, about to reach for Aqua's shoulder, but she instead just jumped up and grabbed him, continuing to sob into his chest

'Geez, this is one pitiful example of a goddess' Kazuma thought as he returned the one sided hug, rubbing the back of the goddess' head. To be fair, he would be pretty upset too if he just had his divinity taken away from him in the blink of an eye as well… hey she smells kind of nice.

This continued on for a few minutes if Kazuma was to guess, and in the meantime this earned plenty of stares from the bystanders. Granted it wasn't a very busy town, but it was hard to miss the only blue haired woman crying into a guy's chest in the town center. Luckily the police hasn't been called yet, nor has the crowd considered him to be a rapist or something. Or maybe this was considered mild in this world?

"W-what are we going to do, Kazuma?" Aqua finally managed to blubber out, "Even as a goddess, I had no offensive capabilities, and now I'm not even a goddess! I don't stand a chance in this world!"

"There, there…" Kazuma reassured, vaguely remembering some lines from a movie script, "Unfortunately there's not much we can do right now, so we'll have to take it one step at a time…"

It wasn't much, but Aqua seemed to calm down a bit at the words, enough so that she would let go of him.

'That was easier than expected'

"We should get registered first," Kazuma stated, holding out the note he just read, "It's the first step of any game, and it was clearly outlined in the note given."

"Wow, you're actually reliable," Aqua sniffed, wiping away her tears, "And I thought you were just gaming all day with no life experience."

"Oi goddess, I finished highschool," Kazuma reminded in an annoyed voice, "I was merely considering my life choices before I got chucked here."

"Ok then Mr. Genius," Aqua scoffed, the traces of her weeping now all gone, "Where are we going to get registered then?"

"How about that building clearly labelled 'Town Hall'" Kazuma stated, pointing right in front of Aqua

"Huh?" the goddess looked confused directly at Kazuma, to which the boy just took her by the shoulders and rotated her into the proper direction and pointed, "Oh, there it is! I forgot that building even existed!"

"Aren't you supposed to be responsible for this world?" Kazuma questioned in an exasperated tone, "I thought you were supposed to know where things were and the state of the world so far!"

"I wouldn't know of something this lowly," Aqua remarked in a flat voice, "I'm a goddess after all, I'm above these low level concepts."

'Jeez, what a piece of work,' Kazuma facepalmed mentally, 'Then again she is fitting of a game developer in the sense that she is ignorant to the playerbase and the game in general'

"Whatever goddess, let's go" Kazuma grumbled as he headed off with Aqua in sequence.

"Hey, I know I used to be a goddess and won't be opposed to you still calling me that, but you can call me Aqua," Aqua smiled casually, "Besides, calling me goddess would look out of place in this world after all."

"And I was never planning to call you that all the time," Kazuma stated, perplexed at how airheaded this ex-goddess was. Once again, she wasn't going to make this easy for him, was she?

* * *

**Closing: Not too much going on here for now, as I don't want too many scene switches to happen in one chapter. I won't make Kazuma too 'normie' here and will try to insert some KonoSuba-esque situations farther down the line. Either way it's my first time with this type of format, so once again feel free to review (or flame)**

**PS: I'll try to make these notes shorter (Or at the very least more to the point) next time as I know everyone hates reading these. There may be technical 'notes' later on, but those will be optional (I'll label them out if you want to skip them).**


	2. Paperwork

The town hall was larger than it appeared on the outside.

There was a large center hall from where they just entered, about two stories high, where a small line of people were gathered around a series of booths. However it appeared that the building was not strictly for governmental purposes, as there were signs directing to places such as a gym, pool and cafeteria as well. What stood out for them was the large sign with an arrow pointing towards a lone booth clearly labelled 'REGISTRATION'.

"Oi, over here," Kazuma waved at Aqua, who appeared to have her eyes lingering towards the cafeteria sign, "We gotta do this first."

The booth in question was manned by a young lady who appeared to be busy stamping some paperwork. She was blonde, and appeared to be quite buxom as her dress shirt was unbuttoned at the top, revealing some cleavage. A short 'ahem' from Kazuma turned her attention to them

"Ah, here for the registration?" The secretary smiled, to which Kazuma nodded, "In that case, please pay the registration fee first, and then we'll get started on the paperwork."

"Yes, yes…" Kazuma stated, looking for his currency bundle, "How much…?"

"1500 Ks(1)" the receptionist informed.

Kazuma did a quick flip through the bundle, noting that the amount he had was about 35,000Ks, but they were only in dividends of 1000, "Do you have change?" The secretary nodded and returned a 500K bill.

Aqua on the other hand fumbled with her pockets, and after half a minute of this she was able to produce one crumpled up 500 and glanced at Kazuma with a despondent look, "This is all I have… Kazuma-san, please lend me some money!"

'What a hopeless goddess…' Kazuma fumed as he produced another 1000 from his stack whilst pushing the ex-goddess off of him to prevent another scene from starting. Luckily she settled down again as she realised she was able to pay the registration fees.

"Great, now please follow me," the blonde gestured down the hall as she joined them outside the booth, "We'll have you fill out some paperwork and write a test before sending you off."

"Wait, test?" both Aqua and Kazuma blurted out in worry. First thing in this world and they were off to write a test with no preparation? It reminded Kazuma of the entrance exams during his school days, something which he wasn't too keen on repeating for a while…

"Don't worry, we get that a lot," the secretary smiled as they stopped before a plain door, "You don't need to study for it- that basically defeats the whole point."

Kazuma was perplexed. What type of a test was this? Sure testing you off the bat was the most accurate way of seeing if someone actually knew something for good, but aren't tests meant to be studied and conquered since the dawn of time? Sure he wasn't going to question this, as he didn't want to needlessly complicate himself when it was already explained to him in the simplest terms.

"Anyways, please take a seat inside," the secretary continued, leading them through the door into what appeared to be a small classroom, "I have to return to my post, so I'll get someone to hand out the exams and answer your questions during the examination."

With that she left, leaving the two inside the room looking for a seat. Granted this wasn't too hard as they were the only ones within the room- Aqua immediately took a back row seat in the corner farthest from the front desk, while Kazuma took a row in front of her.

"Hey, aren't you going to sit next to me?" Aqua asked, tapping on the boy's shoulder.

Kazuma was confused initially but quickly caught up to her gist on trying some 'unofficial aid'.

"How are we going to-" he started before the door opened.

A brunette entered the room, carrying with her two large stacks of paper. She laid a package in front of Kazuma and Aqua both, along with a few extra sheets of paper separate from the test package.

"Alright, just fill out the forums here and we can get started on with the test," the lady explained, "You don't have a time limit for the test but the recommended completion time would be around 4.5 hours."

"You can't finish this in 4.5 hours!" Kazuma blurted out as he examined the test package provided to him. To say it was huge would be an understatement- it rivalled some of the textbooks he bought in highschool by terms of thickness, not to mention all of these pages were going to be exam questions!

"Once again, don't worry about that," she sighed but returned a smile, "You don't have a time limit, and trust me, its not what it looks."

"Well, alright," Kazuma stated reluctantly, taking a pen and started to fill out the forums. Aqua was already done the paperwork at this time, given that she didn't ask any questions about the integrity of the test.

"…"

The test instructor looked blankly at the paperwork that was just filled in. 'Satou Kazuma' and 'Aqua'? Great, another bunch of people that were just sent from some faraway land she probably couldn't even pronounce, even without considering the fact that these two may just be delusional. Nonetheless she gave them a smile out of courtesy, "Alright, you may begin your tests now!"

-break-

For Kazuma, it was one of the worst and most confusing tests he had ever laid his eyes on (and written, for that matter).

Granted many of the questions were exceedingly easy, such as basic math, hours of the day, basic language phrases and the such, others were so difficult that he wasn't even able to guess- they either involved experimental sciences or just things that he had never even heard of before. That wasn't even including the headscratchers, such as the questions asking 'Rock, paper, scissors- pick one?', 'Which is the correct color?', or 'Smack the left side of this page as hard as you can'. Much of his time was spent on asking why the questions were so hard/wondering what to do, and why were there so many questions that seemingly made no sense- the only answer was not to worry and that it was only a 'basic competency test' and that passing was based on a different criteria rather than how many questions were answered 'correctly'.

Oh, and Aqua's plan of cheating didn't materialize either- considering that they were the only two in the exam room, the invigilator sat right in front of them watching in real time, not to mention Kazuma never switched his seat. Surprisingly enough Aqua didn't ask any questions about the exam, not even at the outlandish questions given- as a result, she was able to finish a whole half hour earlier than Kazuma (who took 4 hours).

Both of them were now in a waiting lounge, where Kazuma was flipping through some magazines, while Aqua was trying to work the remote for the box television set which was displaying and sounding off static. Eventually Kazuma noticed her frustrations and looked at the remote himself before telling her that it was actually for a CD player, and the said player wasn't even plugged in. Fiddling around with the channel knobs and re-adjusting the antenna yielded a channel that was actually discernable from the static, but was still hard to identify the on screen action. Kazuma sighed, there was only one thing left to do…

_SMACK_

At this, the TV screen jumped around a bit and made a screeching static noise before finally settling down- most of the static was gone and the audio was actually audible and not just whirred out noise.

"Huh, I wasn't expecting that to work," Kazuma scratched his head sheepishly as he made his way back to a seat.

"Impressive for a shut-in…"

"Oi, stop calling me that," Kazuma refuted in an annoyed voice, "Besides my magic actually worked in fixing the TV."

"That's a tragic story Robert," the news reporter on screen stated, shuffling around some papers, "Now back to our story unfolding in Chernarus."

Both Kazuma and Aqua piped up at that statement- they were informed that their currency was the Chernarussian Koruna in the note received, and doing a one plus one calculation figures that they were probably in Chernarus, the country/region in question on the evening news.

"In a series of new offensives, the Chernarussian movement of the Red Star, otherwise known as the 'chedaki', has gained more and more ground in the province of South Zagoria and are now approaching the major port city of Elektrozavodsk. The government is rushing reinforcements into the city, but it seems unlikely that the city would hold out at the current pace the fight is going."

The scene switches to a military truck carrying tanks, and soldiers set up in sandbagged positions before switching to a scene with seemingly ordinary civilians wearing black vests and carrying futuristic looking rifles walking through a village.

"While major countries have not yet entered the conflict, the private sector has- Private Military Companies from around the world have been hired by the Chernarussian government to take care of matters the government is finding its hands full in- catching arms smugglers, security for government installations, and even security for international organizations as they inspect the state of affairs in the country. However this is not without its downsides- a recent clash in Chernogorsk has led to several civilian fatalities and the death of one police officer sparking much outrage amongst the civilian population."

The scene swaps again, this time in low resolution, of what appears to be a blonde haired woman escorting two children and a babushka looking woman into a black SUV. She looks around a bit before hanging up her rifle and getting into the driver's seat, quickly peeling away.

"What you just saw was the only footage covered in the incident. While the circumstances are not clear, the police and government are conducting an investigation over this matter as we speak. Representative for the company involved, ION,inc. has made a statement that the individual may be a rouge and can be dangerous, and all members will be thoroughly screened and debriefed to ensure that such incidents will not happen again. Coming up next: Could there be a reason to hold onto your toenail clippings now? This is Marian Quandt, AAN. Back to you guys at-"

"Ah, you got it working again? Wonderful!" a familiar secretary entered the room, breaking the two out of their daze with the television, "The results of your tests are in- we're just going to review your results and hand you official identification before sending you off on your way."

The two followed her into another classroom just down the hall, where she produced two large stacks in the form of their exams, followed by two pieces of plastic, which was probably their official credentials.

"Alright Kazuma," the secretary started, pointing at the front cover of the exam, "It appears that you're generally average in most areas, but you exhibit decently high intelligence and extremely high luck- so far you're the only one that has never lost a single round of rock-paper-scissors, and only got one guessing question wrong."

The gears in Kazuma's head began to click upon hearing those words- the test was basically stat-checking in the game world, just presented in a different form.

"You also appear to be highschool educated, making you eligible for college or university entrance exam right off the bat," she continued before turning to Aqua.

"Unfortunately for you (2)Ms. Aqua your intelligence appears to be relatively low, and your luck is some of the poorest I have ever seen," the secretary said with some concern, "However you appear to have incredible knowledge about how the human body works, along with water-related sciences, and your one of the strongest I have seen physically, ever"

Aqua puffs out her chest triumphantly, "Are you impressed at how powerful the god-"

"Huh?"

"Sorry, she tends to get carried away sometimes with online roleplay," Kazuma quickly blurted out as he covered Aqua's mouth, "Please, carry on."

'She has absolutely no life experience does she' Kazuma thought as he took his hand back.

"…But unfortunately you do not appear to be qualified in any sort of education, meaning that your jobs are solely restricted to the most basic ones, and most of them do not pay incredibly well," the secretary continued.

"You've got to be kidding me!" Aqua wailed, grabbing the secretary by the collar, "There's got to be some other way around this, because I'm not spending four years of my life in school with a bunch of brats!(3)"

'Takes one to say one', Kazuma mentally facepalmed.

"…please relax, Ms. Aqua," the office worker raised her hands, with Aqua releasing her at that, "You can take a highschool equivalency test, and if you score well enough, you can get a highschool diploma, or only take a few courses you need compared to doing a whole four years"

"…this isn't how a goddess should be treated" Aqua grumbled in discontent.

"…sorry?"

"Yeah don't mind her, she was just grumbling to herself," Kazuma tried to patch up quickly.

'What a hopeless basketcase'

"…anyways here's your Identification Numbers and government issued IDs," the office worker continued on with a smile, passing two pieces of plastic to both Kazuma and Aqua "We just need to take your picture before-"

"What is the meaning of THIS?" Aqua shrieked, grabbing the office worker by the collar again with one hand while pointing to her ID cards with another.

"I-I don't see what the problem is," the bureaucrat raised her hands up again while glancing down at the cards.

Kazuma looked over in interest. His ID was as standard as anything he'd expected, with name, birthday, date issued/expired, and so on- what could possibly be the problem with Aqua-

'Aqua Švábová(4)'

"Why did you name me after a freaking cockroach?!"

"…I'm very sorry, Ms. Aqua," the panicked office worker explained, "You never placed a surname in your registration forums, and legally you are to have a surname in your government ID, so we used a computer generated name as a placeholder"

"…can you at least change the name?" Aqua stated with a more reasonable tone.

"Yes, but you can't do that right now," the secretary stated bashfully but with sympathy, "You can after three months of residency within the country, however"

"…hmmph"

Kazuma on the other hand was trying not to laugh- as much as he sympathized with being named something that outlandish, he almost agreed with how fitting it was with the type of behavior Aqua was dishing out- was this some form of indirect retribution, or just Aqua's bad luck playing out? Additionally, whose idea was it to make their family name after a household pest…?

"…anyhow please stand against the whiteboard and look directly at the camera," the secretary regained her composure again, placing the cards into a printer as both applicants had their pictures taken.

"Whew, we're almost finished here," she chuckled, handing back their now photo ID cards, a stamped note and a set of keys, "Here's the keys to your apartment- you'll find the unit number and address attached to the keychain. The first month has already been paid for"

Kazuma's eyes widened, "Awesome! But is there a reason for this?"

"Yes, mainly due to the massive brain drain our country is experiencing," she explained, "We're trying to incentivize people into staying given that they have an adequate amount of education/potential, as you have seen in the tests you wrote."

"Fair enough," Kazuma remarked, remembering the news report, "Also, how much is the rent?"

"6,000Ks a month"

'So we have enough for three months, given living costs' Kazuma calculated roughly.

"Also, what's the paper for?" Kazuma gestured towards the stamped note.

"That's your qualifications, to help you find your first jobs," she explained, "You can apply at the office right across from here. Additionally there are many 'informal' jobs going around here, but most of them don't pay as well"

'Employment assistance? Not bad'

"Anyways, is that all?" the office worker asked.

"Pretty much"

"Great!" she smiled, handing another booklet to Kazuma and Aqua, "Please enjoy your new life in Chernarus, and stay safe. Here is a booklet to get you started on the essentials. Otherwise, best of luck out there!"

"Thank you very much miss"

"You can call me Luna," the office worker revealed, "We're not just a strictly government institution- we serve as a community center as well, so I hope to see you all again!"

"Thank you Luna," Kazuma stated again before glaring at Aqua "And I'm sorry for all the commotion we caused-"

"Kazuma!" Aqua quipped

"Don't worry about it," Luna returned with a bashful smile, "Once we had individual come in without pants asking if we have cocaine, and when the security took him out he proceeded to defecate on the floor"

Kazuma just returned with a deadpanned look. It was one of the few moments where he truly had no comment. He decided to ignore what was just said and turned his attention back to a pouting Aqua

"-why are you so mean, you damn shut in?" Aqua continued, "You should treat your goddesses with more respect"

"I hate to burst your bubble, Cockroach-san," Kazuma teased, trying not to snicker, "But you're no longer a goddess anymore, so-"

"Kazuma!"

-break-

Aqua was asleep by the time Kazuma arrived at their apartment.

Luckily there were two bedrooms in the unit. Kazuma just plopped the ex-goddess into the bed of the smaller room before he continued exploring his surroundings.

The apartment was pretty typical, with the standard living room, kitchen, bedroom and bathroom. It was pretty spartan but had a few pieces of furniture included such as a table, chairs and a couch along with the beds in the bedroom. They were on the fifth floor, a good floor above the apartments in the immediate vicinity, giving them a good view of the ocean. In other words, a perfectly livable apartment.

Kazuma then got into studying the packet he was given, because god forbid if he let Aqua do it. Apparently they were in the town of Miroslavl, a mere thirty kilometers away from Chernogorsk, which in turn was only a few kilometers from Elektrozavodsk, the city which was mentioned in the news. Apparently the 'chedaki' mentioned was the militant communist party in Chernarus, trying to overthrow the current government and installing a totalitarian regime. They were responsible for a series of assassinations and were frequently involved in extortion and illegal trafficking, and as such, citizens were advised to stay far away from them. Also mentioned was the National Party- while also somewhat anti-government, they were nowhere near as violent as their communist counterparts, but citizens were still advised to keep their distance.

On the brighter side, Kazuma learned that the average wage was around 30,000Ks monthly, and the price of a bread loaf was merely 20Ks, meaning that the costs of living were quite low if they stuck to the basics.

'Man… what a day!' Kazuma thought. The wallclock told him that it was already 11:30PM and he should go to bed early to get himself ready, but part of that was why he couldn't get to sleep- In one day, he had died, gotten revived and given a new identity, with an useless goddess tossed into the fray nonetheless. It was a hell of a story to believe.

Throwing open the balcony window, Kazuma walked outside. Even though he was allegedly a mere thirty kilometers from a warzone, it still felt as peaceful as ever- ocean waves, a clear night sky and crickets chirping- a departure from the busy metropolis centers of Japan, but a welcome one indeed.

"…osion!" a voice echoed across the buildings, snapping Kazuma out of his dreamy state.

"Huh-"

BOOM

* * *

**(1): Proper term is Kč in Czech, I'm just writing it as Ks for simplicity.**

**(2): Yes I am aware of the Japanese honorifics, I'm only having explicitly non-Japanese characters use this**

**(3): I figured Aqua would be more disappointed in the ego sense, so I had her act this way.**

**(4): Šváb means cockroach in Czech, and believe it or not it is a surname. Švábová is the female version of it (-ová prefix added to nouns in order to feminize a surname, please correct me if I'm wrong). However it is more likely to refer to Swabians (a German minority)**

**Other Notes: Not too much happening here, but I promise there will be more action in the later chapters- I'm just trying to do some world building without creating a huge info-dump (as I know how much people hates those). As you can note Chernarus has some elements Czech republic/Czechoslovakia (obviously not an accurate portrayal of Czech culture, lol), the same country as the creators of the original game, Arma 2. Either way please leave a review, as they will help a lot in improving the overall quality of the story, or you can just flame me (I find them entertaining).**


	3. Noise Complaints

Kazuma hardly got any sleep that night.

The explosions kept going off at irregular intervals until almost 5 AM, where by that time Kazuma had already given up on sleeping and just decided to count the explosions instead- he had counted around a dozen or so, with about four of them happening at around 3 AM. The explosions would be anywhere from a slightly larger firecracker to what sounded like a truck tyre exploding. Aqua proved to be a deep sleeper through this and still managed to snore it out throughout the night.

'So the rent is cheap from the noise complaints…' Kazuma thought as he finally woke up. He had taken a power nap until about 9 AM, enough so that he could function coherently for the day. Aqua was still asleep, but Kazuma was more interested in letting the giant sleep rather than have her cause more trouble for the time being.

Immediately feeling hungry and remembering the cafeteria from yesterday, Kazuma wandered back towards the town hall to check it out for himself. He hoped that it would still be open as he wasn't interested in running around town looking for a quick fill, even if the town wasn't very large.

Luckily for him breakfast didn't end until 9:30, and it was just past 9:15 when he arrived. The cafeteria almost reminded Kazuma of his highschool, only there was less colors and the place was maybe only two thirds of the size. While there was a few options to pick from, Kazuma decided to go with the flow and pick the 'Breakfast Combo' advertised on the outside, as it looked the most familiar and was decently priced- Garlic eggs, buttered bread and coffee with a few sides of ham, coming up to no more than 50Ks.

With his hunger now gone Kazuma now remembered that he still needed to get a job and the aforementioned papers that he was given. On the way back he ran into Aqua, who was just headed out their apartment with a slip of paper in her hand.

"Good morning, Kazuma"

"Morning Aqua" Kazuma returned, not interested in starting trouble for the moment being.

"I'm just out to get some food before heading over to that employment office"

"Oh, alright," the boy acknowledged, "Want to meet up at the office or…?"

"I can manage, see ya around"

"You too"

Kazuma smiled. He wasn't sure if this was going to be a frequent occurrence, but seeing Aqua act like a normal human being was a welcome departure from her antics yesterday. Hopefully this isn't a one timer…

Fifteen minutes later he was back at the town square again, this time with the papers he needed to apply. The process was surprisingly anticlimactic compared to the 'basic competency test'- after a short wait in line he handed in his paper to the office lady at the desk, and a few technical questions later (which were similar to his high school science class) he was told he was now employed at a chemical plant in Chernogorsk. Granted it was a bit too close to danger with the armed conflict going on but the pay was 46,000Ks monthly (noticeably above average) for the aforementioned reasons and skilled labor shortages.

Leaving the office in a good mood, he noticed that Aqua was still missing from the office. He wondered what was taking her so long, given that his breakfast didn't take him that long to finish… only he realized that it was probably over after he left the cafeteria.

'She better not get into more trouble today…' Kazuma sighed, headed back towards the cafeteria. Even though breakfast was over, it seemed likely that Aqua was still going to be there if they still served food…

Surely enough he spotted the ever familiar blue hair belonging to the one and only useless goddess as he approached the cafeteria door, looking through the window. There was several empty bowls and plates on her table, including but not limited to a half eaten pan of frosted jam bread and several squeezed pop cans.

Noticing the door opening, Aqua immediately turned around and leaped towards Kazuma after realizing who he was.

"Kazuma-san, Kazuma-san!" she wailed, slipping onto her knees and grabbing his shirt, "I thought I still had my 500 from yesterday, so I bought myself a snack and now I can't pay it back! Please Kazuma, lend me some money again!"

Kazuma grumbled in disbelief. How could she literally forget that the registration yesterday rendered her broke and that she still had her change? Looks like his hope on a normal Aqua wasn't going to get him anywhere…

"Alright, fine…" Kazuma agreed as he was still in a good mood from the job situation, "But only because I'm in a good mood right now…"

"Thank you, Kazuma!"

"So… how much?" Kazuma inquired towards the Cashier.

"650"

Kazuma's eye twitched as he turned back to the goddess, "COCKROACH-SAMA! WHY DID YOU SPEND 650 EVEN KNOWING THAT YOU ONLY HAD 500?!"

"I-I'm sorry Kazuma! The Buchteln looked too good, and after having one for myself I couldn't help it!" Aqua cried, latching back onto him and rubbing her head into his shirt, "And please stop calling me that! I'm a goddess, not some house pest!"

"You're totally acting like one right now!"

"Kazumaaa!"

'This girl is hopeless…' Kazuma mentally groaned as he produced a 1000 from his pocket and taking the change.

Kazuma apologized to the cafeteria lady profusely, which she accepted bluntly. The young man waited for Aqua to leave the cafeteria so he can hold her breadpan, as she went off to the employment board as well. Seeing that there was still half a pan of the 'Buchteln' left he decided to take one piece and try it for himself.

'Huh, Aqua has a point, these are pretty good' Kazuma thought as he finished off the current piece and going for another.

Aqua came out a short while later, and needless to say she was not impressed at the young man for eating the prized bread out of her viewrange

"Kazuma! Don't be hogging my Buchteln behind my back!"

'This little…'

"Listen here you little Cockroach, you spend my money on food and then have the audacity to claim it for yourself?"

"Well of course, I am a goddess after all"

"Damn you then, I'm having this all to myself"

"Wait, Kazuma! I'm sorry!" Aqua pleaded quickly, "I'm sorry I got carried away!"

-break-

Kazuma has had enough of the noise after a few days of it.

He slept in on the first day of work, and ended up being late by three hours. Part of that was attributed to the convoluted bus schedules which happens to only arrive every hour and a half before proceeding to take half an hour to arrive at his stop. Luckily his employer was sympathetic as he knows of the situation in Kazuma's hometown, but reminded him not to be late in the future.

Kazuma was responsible for recycling acid from metal leach mixtures- he was to boil the solution off in a kettle and sample the solution every half hour to make sure nothing was going wrong(1). It wasn't glamorous, but it paid well enough for what it was- the main problem was the extensive commute times, and by the time he went home it was already 7 PM (Once again due to bus schedules) meaning that he had to go to sleep immediately so he can get enough sleep and not sleep in for the next day. This worked well enough to work life stable, but yielded little time for anything else.

Aqua was posted at a local fast food restaurant, and unsurprisingly to Kazuma there were a few scenes with the customers already, but even Kazuma had to admit that many of them aren't even her fault when he saw them for himself. The most prominent example to him was when a customer was demanding for a free ice cream as part of the promotional deal that was going on, but when Aqua pointed out that he had already did it four times within the past half hour (as the manager demanded her to enforce the store policy) he proceeded to squat in the middle of the dining area and proceeded to sling a torrent of insults at the goddess while slapping his arms on the floor. The manager finally stepped in after five minutes of this and gave him some more ice cream before proceeding to yell at Aqua for not listening to the customer… you just can't please some people.

'Damn it… this new world is basically like Japan, but with more problems!' Kazuma grumbled as he laid on the couch in the living room. It was around 1 AM, and he had just been awaken to the sound of an explosion and being followed up by Aqua snoring away. He honestly has no idea how she could sleep through all of this…

Deciding to take a view of the problem himself, Kazuma climbed up to the roof through the ladder hatch in the stairwell, which was surprisingly not locked. The seven story building proved to be the highest vantage point in the town, maybe except for the hotel down at the beach which was ten stories high- but that was out of view from most of the town.

Once again the explosions had gone off throughout the late night hours, only stopping when the sun was threatening to rise. While it was hard to distinguish where the explosions were coming from due to the lack of light (There aren't nearly as much road lamps and lights as compared to Japan), Kazuma did notice that all of the explosions were called out with a distinctive 'Explosion!' chant before it came, and based on the flashes of light that he saw all of them were still a good distance airborne. Doing a little intuition he figured out that they must have come from the taller buildings from the town, so he could narrow down the search to the few apartment blocks and buildings having more than three stories.

As much as he hated to admit it, Kazuma needed Aqua for this task. While the town wasn't very large, he still needed to get down from the building before chasing the perpetrator on foot, or at the very least making a clear identification of the individual to file a police report. Aqua actually agreed pretty quickly to the plan once Kazuma stated that he was willing to forgive her debt with him, as it recently grew by another 550Ks due to an unchecked snack time before payday.

The plan was quite simple: Once the chant 'Explosion!' was heard, Kazuma would fire his flare gun so he could attempt to spot the perpetrator closest to the explosion. Aqua, which would be waiting downstairs in the front yard of the apartment would be instructed by Kazuma through the two way radio as he would update her on the target's location and to keep eye of the situation so it wouldn't go sour as Aqua presses the chase. In all the preparations had set Kazuma back around 2600Ks, but that would be a small price to pay in comparison with having a good nights sleep at the end of the day.

After several rehearsals and rehashes of the plan, the two would be ready. Now they wait in stalk of their prey…

"Oi Aqua, are you still with me here?" Kazuma checked on the radio.

"Yes, yes Kazuma, you asked me that earlier," Aqua returned in an annoyed tone.

"Good, I need you to be awake, otherwise we can't carry out the mission at hand"

"You already told me that"

"Okay, I'm sorry for intruding too much," Kazuma sighed. He would have reprimanded the goddess otherwise but even he realized that he was being too intrusive, given how he last checked up on her merely five minutes ago to see if she was still awake.

'Only 12:38 AM, hope this will end soon,' Kazuma thought as he checked the clock on the two way radio set. Waiting sure was boring… was this how soldiers felt when they weren't fighting? He had remembered some cutscenes from war games back home where the protagonist would just be stooped around a campfire in the middle of the night, doing nothing…

The only thing to bring Kazuma out of his half daze was when he heard some faint muttering from across the building at around 1 AM. He had heard some hearty laughing off in the distance on his nighttime intelligence gathering before, but it was the first time that he heard chattering so close- his building didn't have that type of people, he assumed. Did they bring friends over?

"-let the collapse of thine origin manifest," the voice now said, now more audible than muttering.

'What in the world is this person talking about?' Kazuma thought to himself, bewildered.

"Summon before me the root of thy power hidden within the lands of the kingdom of demise!"

'Is this person under the influence of-'

"EXPLOSION!"

'!'

That was his cue, the ever familiar explosion call, and this one was the loudest he had heard, probably given how close he was to the source. Instinctively he grabbed the flare gun with an illumination round already loaded into it and fired it into the air.

When the flare started burning he finally caught a good glance of the perpetrator, which happened to be on the same roof as him. It was a short girl with brown hair, wearing a dark blue lab coat and goggles tossing out a small ball shaped object. She had noticed how it got brighter, and turned around to face Kazuma. Both of them were in shock at each other for a moment before she decided to make a run for it

"AQUA!" Kazuma yelled into the radio as he took off after the perpetrator, "I found the explosion maniac, she's on our building! Get ready to watch the back doors!"

There was no response, and unfortunately the girl was closer to the roof hatch and was able to get down quicker.

'Damn it all, looks like I overestimated her usefulness after all,' Kazuma grumbled as he approached the ladders, "Oi Aqua, the explosion maniac is coming for your Buchteln"

He knew that his tactic worked when he heard a shriek at the other end

"You can't let her get away! I was still saving the peach jam one for later! I'll be ruined if I can't have any of it for breakfast"

"Then watch the back doors, damn it!"

"Kazuma!"

'Maybe I should just let her sleep next time,' Kazuma thought as he slid down the ladder, and not three feet in front of him was the alleged explosion maniac, collapsed in a heap.

"I'm sorry sir, please don't hurt me," the girl stated in fear as she tried to get up, "I swear I'm not trying to kill anyone or anything, I'm just testing my batch in a safe location"

While Kazuma was out for revenge in shutting down whoever was making the noise, he didn't expect it to be a little girl. He paused, what should he do? Given that she wasn't posing a threat (nor was she being outright offensive), he couldn't bear with himself to lay down the classic knuckle sandwich. He was an advocate for gender equality, yet a ruthless beating felt wrong in this instance…

"Are you alright?"

"Not really, I haven't eaten in three days"

"…do you want some food?" Kazuma stated in autopilot.

The girl lit up at this statement instantly, "…thank you good sir!"

"…Kazuma! Please tell me the Buchteln alright! Answer me!"

And with that Kazuma muted his radio.

-break-

"Hey, we're closing soon. Please take what you need quickly."

Kazuma and Aqua carried the perpetrator to the nearby convenience store, which happens to close fairly late at night. Not sure what she wants, the explosion girl just let Kazuma pick out the food, which amounted to a can of instant sausages, chicken sandwich and a can of apple juice. As she was desperately hungry she insisted that they can just eat at the parking lot outside, while thanking them profusely.

"So," Kazuma started, watching in amazement as the little girl wolfed down the food at astonishing speed, "Who are you and what exactly are you doing…?"

"…my name is Megumin! An Arch Wizard who commands explosion magic upon this world!" she introduced dramatically, setting her foodstuffs down as she got to her gesturing.

'Even here, chunnis exist?'

Both Kazuma and Aqua were holding back a chuckle, "Don't you mean Megumi?"

"No! My name is Megumin!" she corrected, but not without a double take, "Say, what's your name? You almost sound like you're Japanese yourself."

"My name is Kazuma, and while my background is Japanese, I'm a Chernarussian citizen," Kazuma stated. He worried that if he gave away his old world identity he might cause more trouble than he intends.

"I'm the goddess of-" Aqua started, seeing the introductions kicking off.

"She's Aqua," Kazuma stated quickly, "Don't mind her, she gets carried away with her roleplaying delusions as it gives her a sense of greatness"

"Hey!"

"But anyways, Arch Wizard?" Kazuma continued, "Are you making explosives for a roleplay, a game or something else?"

"What? No!" Megumin quickly blurted, "I make explosives because that's my job!"

"So you're a terrorist?"

"No Kazuma, you've got it all wrong!" Megumin cried, "I'm a student at Novigrad(2) university developing explosives!"

"Wow, universities here have kid programs that let them off with explosives?"

"I'm not a kid! I skipped grades and got into university early!" she stated clearly upset, "Besides, I'm 16!"

Kazuma exhaled, trying to vent off his laughter, "I'm sorry Megumin, its just that the circumstances of your story almost comes off as trying to make a joke to us or something with the meme like backstory and weird name…"

"Hmmph," Megumin grumbled, "Is my name actually that funny? Because I get that a lot, and its not my fault my town names everyone in a weird way"

"What are your parents names anyways, if you don't mind?" Kazuma asked.

"My mother is Yuiyui! My father is Hyoizaburo!" Megumin chanted, her portion chunni back in action.

Both Kazuma and Aqua were trying not to laugh at this, so Kazuma decided to change the topic, "So, with the explosives thing, why are you detonating them around town like that? People need to sleep too you know"

"I'm sorry about that, but I needed to find some place where I could test my explosives while I'm away from the campus"

"Huh? Is there something wrong with the campus, even with your field of studies?" Kazuma asked.

"How do I say this… I actually had to sleep on the floor on the financial aid office because I can't afford the rent, and I got kicked out from there when the school year was over"

"Wait… why don't your parents send you rent money?"

"…I spent them on raw materials to make explosives"

'I swear to god, is everyone in this world that bad at financial decisions?' Kazuma thought before continuing, "Don't they provide that stuff in your program?"

"I thought they did too, but instead of making eco-friendly explosives and blowing things up, it turned out to be a hand grenade refurbishment program as they all went bad from being in storage"

'So even in this world college students get treated like slaves'

"Given that, why didn't you just apply to something like that in Japan?" Kazuma asked.

"I applied to the universities in Chernarus as they were the only ones that didn't need to do a whole bunch of paperwork every time you detonated something"

'She has a point there' Kazuma mentally agreed as she got back to finishing her food.

"Well, it's nice talking to you and knowing your deal with the explosions, but seriously detonate them where there are less people sleeping," Kazuma reminded sternly, remembering the whole point of their mission, "Now, where do you live? We'll walk you back."

"I'm fine, but…" Megumin started, before giving Kazuma the best puppy eyes she can manage, "My rent contract ends soon, and I don't have enough to renew it for the current location! If you don't mind, can I live over?"

"Huh?" Kazuma stated, perplexed, "You trust strangers like that?"

"Well you didn't threaten to instantly kill me and bought me food, so I figured it was safe enough to ask!" Megumin reasoned, "Besides, I can help around the house, and I can give you all a cut when the student loans come in, and when I get a job! So please consider my offer!"

"…I'll consider it," Kazuma stated, still a bit surprised, "If you want to meet up to discuss this again, you can find us at the town hall cafeteria in the mornin-"

"Thank you good sir!" Megumin exclaimed, pulling Kazuma into a hug, "I promise that I won't be a bad roommate! And that thing with the noise..."

* * *

**(1): Basically, ores are mixed with highly concentrated acid (usually Hydrochloric) so metals can be extracted from them.**

**(2): The capital city of the country.**

**Notes: I actually revised the chapter, and decided that additional characters will be introduced later on (to avoid too many scene changes). As always, please review!**


	4. Sharp Stick

**AN: Big thanks to H3ctic. for taking time to Beta this chapter. Thanks a bunch man!**

* * *

(flashback)

"Kazuma, do you have a moment?"

Kazuma stiffened up. It wasn't the first time he has been called by his manager, given his track record of being somewhat late (initially from the noise/bus issues) or toiling around a little when his assigned task was complete. As such, he was expecting the worst

"Yes, I do. Something wrong?"

"Not quite," the manager stated, "I was just wondering if you wanted another form of transportation."

"I sure do," Kazuma said, relieved that he was not going to be reprimanded.

"Great," the manager stated, rubbing his hands, "Because boy do I have a deal for you. You see, I just got a newer car, and I wanted to get rid of my current junker as it's just taking up space. I was wondering if you wanted to take it off my hands…"

"I would!" Kazuma replied excitedly, "How much, though?"

"7000Ks"

Kazuma's eyes widened at the deal. Many of the cars he had seen in the catalogs were around 130,000Ks, even for the cheaper ones in a fairly rough condition, with the cheapest he has seen at around 34,000Ks (with no guarantees of it actually running reliably). Even if this was a really old car, it was a great deal, given that it still runs.

"I'll take it!" the boy blurted out, but then remembered the exorbitant legal prices with cars in Japan, "But what about licensing and such?"

The manager looked around a little before shifting a bit closer to Kazuma, "I'm going to be honest; licensing isn't really enforced too strictly in the countryside given how sparsely populated we are outside the capital. As long as you drive safely, no one really cares that much about it. You do need to buy a license plate at town hall, however."

"I see…"

Kazuma had seen his manager's vehicle before (An aging Skoda 120L as indicated by the badge on the rear) when he was leaving work. It was easily identified with the faded red body panels in various parts of the car, in stark contrast with the mostly blue portions of the car, which was heavily rusted. He never sat inside it before, and was quickly overcome by the stench of what seemed to be a mix of rotting wood and vomit as he entered the front seat. That wasn't even talking about the questionable whitish-yellow splotch on the center…

"Apologies for that," the manager apologized as he got into the driver seat, "This was only intended to be my personal vehicle, and my son borrowed it a few times to go clubbing with his friends, heh…"

"It's all good," Kazuma stated, trying to manage some small talk, "Cars are meant to be used, aren't they?"

"They sure are," the manager chuckled as he turned the key in the ignition switch. The four cylinder engine grumbled to life in a dull and surprisingly hushed tone from behind the passenger's seat.

"Anyways, do you know how to drive manual?" the senior continued, pushing the gearstick from side to side in emphasis.

"No," Kazuma stated worriedly, looking at the alien device. He's seen it in Japan before (both in person and in anime), but his family drove the more familiar automatic.

"It's really not that bad," he reassured, his left foot pressing something as he moved the stick left-up, "Just think of the third pedal as a 'go' switch. You let off on it slowly, and when the car shakes a bit you can give it some gas and then release it. Otherwise if you're moving, its used to change gears. Watch a bit as I drive you back."

Kazuma watched intently on how his senpai's feet and hands moved- turning, braking, starting up and hill stop/start. The last one had him particularly intrigued, given how he pulled the parking brake- it was apparently to hold the vehicle in place as they got ready to start.

Eventually they got back to Kazuma's hometown, and parked in a nearby gravel parking lot. From the tape-on clock* just above the climate controls, the trip took them around half an hour, a vast improvement from the public transit.

"So, I'll ask again, will you take the deal?" the manager questioned.

"I'll take it," Kazuma said without hesitation.

"Great!" he smiled, shaking the boy's hand, "I'll deduct the amount from your paycheck. Also, if you're practicing and you stalled a few times, it may be a good idea to rest the car a bit before turning it back on to charge the batteries."

"Right," Kazuma stated.

'The ignition uses the battery after all, makes sense'

"Anyways my wife is coming to pick me up," the man concluded, stepping out of the car, "Try to have a bit of fun when you're learning… Driving is not only a skill, but a form of freedom, knowing that you can get anywhere, anytime. But anyways, see you tomorrow, Mr. Satou."

"You too…" Kazuma started, "But on a random note, why did you decide to sell the car to me?"

"I sold the car to you because you're a great worker with good potential, and as a result I can do less work- I mean help the company out greatly," the manager blundered, "I figured that the car would help you out in that respect."

"Thank you, I hope to keep that up," Kazuma smiled. He had always considered himself to be lazy but brilliant, and it was good that his seniors saw that in him as well.

"Alright. See you tomorrow!"

With that out of the way, Kazuma started practicing the deed of driving himself. He had managed to stall twice due to his unfamiliar feel with the car's clutch pedal on when it actually 'engaged', but otherwise the experience of driving went off without too much of a hitch, as speeding up and shifting gears were pretty much the same concept. Only the downshift was a bit more rough- he tried to practice the 'neutral-throttle-shift-throttle*' he saw his manager do, but was only successful half the time, while the other half gave the car a _bump_ as he engaged the gear.

Kazuma smiled. He was getting the hang of driving, and he loved it. Granted it wasn't a Mercedes or something, but it was a vehicle that drove for him. It was a newfound sense of freedom he wished he had experienced earlier.

-break-

But that was all four weeks ago.

Kazuma was out of work about a week ago- While the fighting for Elektrozadvosk had lasted longer than expected, the government forces were thrown out of the town as the 'chedaki' advanced. As a result of an artillery barrage, a fire started at the factory destroying the power transformers, and while no one was injured/killed, everyone in the factory was out of work (and consequently income) due to the power supply.

On the brighter side, the town somehow correctly recognized Kazuma as the one who put a stop to the noise complaints, and as a result he was rewarded 110,000Ks from the town hall for his achievements, along with various gifts of food and miscellaneous items from grateful locals. Luckily Megumin wasn't identified as the suspect, and as a result Kazuma agreed to allow her to move in. It was still going to be a few days however, as her rent didn't expire yet. They still met up in the meanwhile, sharing food at the cafeteria.

Also in terms of driving, Aqua convinced Kazuma to let her drive in exchange for an illicit supply of free food at her restaurant. Kazuma relented at the concept of free things given his lack of income, but was still reluctant to let her borrow the car too frequently given her either stalling the engine or going rough on the shifter when she drives.

At the current moment Kazuma was eating a burger at the fast food restaurant that Aqua was currently working at. It was almost the end of her shift, and apparently an argument had broken out with another difficult customer for the second time in the shift.

"WHERE THE HELL IS THE KETCHUP, YOU DUMB BITCH?!"

"I placed it on the side! Didn't you see the ketchup packs?"

"WHY DIDN'T YOU PLACE IT IN THE BURGER, THEN?"

"You never specified that! How was I supposed to know?"

"…You dumb whore! Don't you know what the proper way to handle food at a fast food restaurant?" the customer continued unfazed, grabbing a ketchup pack and throwing it at Aqua's face, "Hurry up and do it correctly!"

While Kazuma did enjoy seeing Aqua get herself into blunders, this was too far for him, as this customer was clearly stepping his bounds too much.

"Hey, that's enough-"

"Get away douchebag, I'm about to teach this whore a lesson," the man spat, swinging around, "Or do you want to join her-"

"GOD BLOW"

'!'

Instead of cowering away pathetically as Kazuma was used to, Aqua retaliated at the physical transgression. She landed a punch straight into the customer's gut, completely winding him and knocking over two tables as he fell backwards several meters from the blow. While Kazuma would have called her out on calling herself 'godly', he decided that she lived up to her claims in this instance; even with her divinity and powers taken away, her physical abilities were still very apparent…

The man struggled to get up, coughed a few times before looking at Aqua gravely, "You're dead to me."

'What a piece of work,' Kazuma thought as he watched the man leave. Aqua had checked out of her shift by then and they were getting ready to leave.

"Kazuma-san! Why are the customers so mean?" Aqua now cried as soon as they left the store, "First they don't tip, now they're like this!"

"Dammit Aqua! You don't tip in a fast food restaurant!" Kazuma exasperated. He had explained to Aqua the concept of tipping before, yet she didn't seem to grasp it firmly yet…

"mmmfh…"

"…But you're correct on the customers," Kazuma quickly supported, both in agreement and hoping that Aqua didn't make a scene again, "That guy can go fuck himself…"

"…"

"Yes, Aqua?" Kazuma noticed.

"Thank you Kazuma…" Aqua said quietly, looking down at the ground, "For standing up for me…"

Kazuma paused, "It's alright, I guess…"

He felt like he didn't do much back there. But Aqua still noticed and appreciated it. While the two do have a habit of knocking on each other like an old married couple they still stuck up for each other when it was time to. Kind of like the 'real friends' concept…

"I'm going to wait in the car," Aqua stated.

"Yeah, I'll be back in a bit," Kazuma returned, "Gonna get some food first."

(Later…)

Even for its small size, the strip mall Aqua worked at was well stocked on food and home service items, meaning that they didn't have to leave town for the search for basic necessities.

The 11-mart provided a decent stock of food items, snacks and even beer (something which Aqua blew her meager earnings on frequently, much to Kazuma's dismay), while the toolshop provided enough equipment to do basic repairs on their home's fuse box and the car (given that they had the spare parts).

Kazuma was waiting impatiently in line. Shopping was always one of the most time consuming chores in life, whether it was back in Japan or here in Chernarus. Checking his watch (Another thing which he purchased at the strip mall), a good half hour has already passed. He just wanted to get back home already, and luckily he brought his car. Granted the mall was only a five minute walk from their home (the town was small after all), but Kazuma enjoyed taking the car as their pack mule; While the groceries were not that heavy themselves, carrying them in bags was a strain on the fingers even for the short walk.

"Hey Kazuma, mind checking out these doughnuts?" Aqua stated, popping a bag into his basket.

"Gyah! Where did you come from?" Kazuma blurted in surprise.

"I was sitting in the car before I decided to look for a snack," Aqua stated casually.

"…You do realize that you're spending my money in this instance, right?" Kazuma deadpanned at the sweets Aqua just dropped in.

"…No"

"Dammit Aqua, didn't you earn some money already?" Kazuma questioned.

"I did!" Aqua smiled sheepishly, "But I… don't have it."

"Don't tell me you spent it on beer again…"

"Errr… maybe?"

"…Dammit Aqua!" Kazuma sighed as he placed the items on the counter for the cashier, "Remember, you owe me again-"

They were interrupted by the sound a rapid series of sharp clattering pops and glass breaking. Looking out the store window they could see a masked man firing his rifle into the back window of their car before fleeing. Kazuma and Aqua looked at each other with their mouths open at what just happened- if Aqua was sitting in the car, or if Kazuma didn't get distracted by Aqua, both of them would have fallen victim to that attack…

"It looks like the chedaki just claimed another victim," the cashier stated, shaking his head, "They act like the world is just their home, going off on rampages like that. May god bless his poor soul…"

"Wait, there's chedaki here?" Kazuma questioned worriedly, "I thought we were supposed to be away from the fighting!"

"Yeah, but the chedaki have undercover cells everywhere in the country," Aqua explained, "The ones in South Zagoria are even larger, to the point where they can capture and hold territory."

"She's correct," the cashier agreed, bagging up the last of their items, "Despite the political differences, the militia and the National Party have made vows to keep the population safe, but hit and runs are always hard to stop in remote places like here… and that'll be 1150Ks sir."

Kazuma paid the fee and left the store. Then something clicked in his head.

"Aqua, the guy at the restaurant…!"

"Huh? Oh yeah!" Aqua remembered, snapping her fingers, "The one that actually tipped-"

'Did he actually or was that more of an approach?' Kazuma wondered with the straightest face he could manage.

"No you dolt! The one you just 'God blew' an hour ago!"

'Horrible choice of words, Kazuma'

"Oh, that guy! He probably was a chedaki," Aqua stated, luckily ignoring his 'misphrase', "And knowing them, they probably won't stop until they get their targets…"

Kazuma's eye twitched at the realization. Just one month into the new world and already people are after their heads…

"How can we protect ourselves, then?"

"Ever heard of a 'gun license'?"

"Huh?" Kazuma paused.

"You know, gun license," Aqua repeated, "The piece of paper that allows us to carry the same things as the guy that tried to shoot us…"

"For once Aqua, I think you made a good suggestion…"

"Mou, what do you mean 'for once'?" Aqua pouted, "I'm a goddess; I always make good suggestions to mere mortals!"

Kazuma ignored the statement, setting the bags down to check up on his car, mainly the bottom for any broken parts. There appeared to be a lot of bullet holes in the front passenger area, and despite the liquid draining from the bottom there didn't appear to be anything significant broken underneath the vehicle.

'But where did that liquid come from,' Kazuma thought before he heard an ever familiar goddess shrieking.

"Kazuma! It's horrible, they destroyed my beer! I was going to take a few drinks at home, but now its emptied all over the floor!"

Kazuma looked into the front seat and saw broken glass and a large puddle of liquid. It appears the bullets destroyed the beer bottles and now it was pouring through the holes. Kazuma grumbled in frustration, while he could patch the holes in the bottom by welding sheet metal for a few hours, getting rid of the smell was going to take another few weeks…

(A few days later...)

Upon Aqua's suggestion, Kazuma took the firearms theory test with her. It took another week for the license to come in, as they both passed the examinations (albeit barely).

In the meantime both Kazuma and Aqua went to the certified unlicensed range a few kilometers up north to get used to the hang of holding and firing a gun. It took a few blunders for Aqua to handle her weapon properly and to stop with her side-sweeping*, with the last incident nearly taking off Kazuma's head (the bullet clipped his hair); that's not to say the young man was completely competent, evident from the shoulder bruise after a rifle day. The week costed them around 3000Ks, but made them feel more confident with the PM pistol and the SKS rifle, both of which are very common (and cheap) as the country still had large stocks of older Soviet equipment leftover when the army stood down upon the breakup of the Union.

It was also at the range Kazuma noticed something possibly tied to his luck- If there was a wind kicking up downrange and he was about to fire, he would notice that the wind would stop (or at least die down significantly), before kicking back up after he was finished. Additionally, he was commented on having 'exceptional marksmanship skills', being able to reliably hit the head of a target 400 meters away with the SKS*; even when he switched rifles with Aqua, the results were repeated (while Aqua was still struggling to hit something past the 100 meter mark). It makes him wonder, did he survive the firing range mishaps due to his good luck, or because of Aqua's bad luck with hitting anything?

Additionally, the prospect of obtaining firearms opened up a new series of potential earnings: It was hunting season, and with the fact that there's more land than people meant that animal attacks on livestock (and potentially people) were going to increase, demanding some form of control to be implemented. Furthermore, hides and meat were still sought after and can be sold for decent prices on the market, which made the concept all too appealing for both Kazuma and Aqua as they were trying to find a new way to pad their pockets. It was also needed to supplement the increased expenses as Megumin moved in (which was surprisingly anticlimactic due to the lack of explosives related topics as Kazuma had originally prepared, but the chunni tendencies still persisted).

The original plan was to purchase a hunting rifle (more specifically a CZ 550) from the local sporting store, as they were on sale for the season and ammunition was cheap for the 8mm* models they sold. Unfortunately everyone seemed to have the same plan as Kazuma, given that they were fresh out of stock. Frustrated, the duo entered the store across the street, which was had their advertising labelled as 'Sporting goods and other potentially illegal items'- sure it sounded like a joke, but to Kazuma, it never hurts to try…

The interior was fairly small, but was kept clean and tidy. There were a few shelves of items such as camouflage, vests, pouches and the such, while the weapons were kept behind the front counter manned by a brown haired woman in a woodland pattern camouflage.

"Welcome to my store, how can I-" the woman greeted with a smile before pausing, "Oh, it's Kazuma! Very nice to see you at my shop!"

"Huh? You know my name?" Kazuma stated with some worry.

"Of course I do! You're the one that stopped the noise complaints, so its only natural that I know," she continued, "Anyways, you can call me Wiz. How may I help you?"

'At least it was fame in a positive light,' Kazuma mentally exhaled.

"Well, we're looking something to hunt game with," Kazuma started, "And also something for personal protection…"

"Ah, we have those," Wiz stated, "Although I do ask, what's the situation demanding the protection? Our community is quite small around here, so we'll know quickly if something out of line happens with people we know…"

Aqua explained what happened at the strip mall, with Kazuma clarifying some points. Wiz nodded in understanding, yet she was not surprised.

"It seems that they're infiltrating behind the lines again," Wiz shook her head, reaching under the counter and retrieving a pistol with an overtly long barrel, "Here is a PB pistol, similar in handling like the PMs at the firing range, but with an integral suppressor. It can be fired without the suppressor however, and with its dimensions makes it good for practical purposes."

"…How much?" Kazuma asked, disregarding the comment on the silenced weapons.

"18,000Ks"

To Kazuma, the price was steep, compared to the necessities at least.

"Anything cheaper?"

"Well, we do sell CZ 75s for 14,000Ks," Wiz explained, scratching the back of her head, "But the next shipment won't come in for a few months given the current nature of the country, and 9x19mm rounds are fairly scarce around here…"

'The price has to balance out somewhere does it?'

"Sure, I'll consider the PB," Kazuma sighed, deciding that personal safety came over money, "What about the hunting stuff?"

"What are you looking to hunt?" Wiz asked.

"Possibly anything," Kazuma stated, looking at Aqua who gave a nod.

"Hmm," Wiz thought, scratching her chin for dramatic effect, "Give me a second."

She placed the PB away, and went into the back door. Kazuma's eyes widened when she emerged a moment later, toting what appears to be a relatively dated machine gun (Based off the wooden finish on the stock and pistol grip, if Kazuma was to guess) and placed it on the counter.

"This is a Uk 59, the forgotten Czechoslovakian version of the PK," Wiz explained, placing a bullet onto the counter as emphasis, "This is the L version, with a shorter barrel. Otherwise for your needs, you can see that its bullets are comparable to that 8mm. It's basically a hunting rifle that shoots 600 times a minute, hehe…"

"Wait, are you allowed to sell that?" Kazuma asked, "I don't remember that being allowed…"

"No," Wiz stated sheepishly, "That's why the sign is outside as it is."

"Aren't you afraid that the police will catch on?"

"Well you see, everyone thought the sign was a joke, police included," Wiz chuckled, "As a result I neither get busted by law enforcement nor get much business selling 'illicit' items…"

"…"

'Despite the awful financial decisions, I do respect her refuge in audacity concept…'

"Anyways, do you want to continue taking a look?" Wiz asked, placing the PB back onto the desk and ushering them to take another look at the Uk 59.

Kazuma tried to pick the machine gun up, "It's heavy! Don't you have any rifles like those?" He pointed towards the familiar SKS hanging on the wall.

"Ah, we just sold out of proper hunting caliber rifles," Wiz smiled apologetically, "It's hunting season after all, and in case you're wondering, the SKS is quite underpowered against large game like bears, or even deer at longer ranges."

"It was quite powerful against Kazuma's shoulder…" Aqua muttered, causing Kazuma to shoot her a glare.

"What was that?" Wiz asked.

"Nothing!" Aqua clarified.

"Anyways, when are the rifles coming in?" Kazuma questioned.

"Maybe a month or so."

'Looks like we are limited on choices here if we want to hunt this season,' Kazuma sighed mentally, "How much for the machine gun?"

"79,000Ks"

"That's steep!" Kazuma exclaimed. Granted he could afford it, but it would cost almost all of his money at the moment.

"I thought you would say that, and knowing that you're Kazuma I'm going to ask for a favor," Wiz stated.

"What type?" Kazuma asked in a suspicious tone. Surely this wasn't going to be a one sided deal to cause his demise, right? Or god forbid, sexual…

"One moment please," Wiz said, turning to the backdoor, "Hey Darkness, do you have a moment?"

A short moment later a blonde woman came through the backdoor. She bore a stoic expression, wearing a black Dell t-shirt and beige khakis. Kazuma thought she looked absolutely gorgeous, and could tell even through the loose fitting clothes she had a great body. He shook himself out of it however, as he still needed to stay composed in public.

"This is my friend Darkness, and she's in a bit of a pickle right now," Wiz introduced, "You see she's originally a contractor at a private military company called ION, but due to a squabble and miscommunication she got left behind without any official documents to help her leave."

"That's unfortunate…"

"This is a bit large for a favor, but if you're willing to take her in and help her adjust to civilian life while we sort things out, I'd be willing to steeply discount your purchases at my store," Wiz offered, "I'm asking this because I can't have her get kicked out onto the streets if they shut my shop down from financial problems due to the lack of legal status…"

Kazuma was in a bit of a dilemma at this. Cheaper items were always good, but was it worth the hassle? Megumin didn't cause that much trouble, but its hard to say if his luck would hold up all the time…

"I'll consider it," Kazuma stated flatly, considering the Realpolitik as with Megumin, "We can talk more about it in the cafeteria tomorrow-"

"Thank you Kazuma!" Darkness exclaimed, taking Kazuma into her marshmallowy hell, "When I saw you and your partner haul the little girl down the street, I just knew I had to-"

Noticing the looks from everyone, Darkness paused for a moment, "Ah, sorry for me getting ahead of myself. My name is Darkness, and I hope we can get along well. Thank you for considering to take me in…"

'She seems off… was she stalking us the whole time…?'

"My friend can be… eccentric at times," Wiz stated, clearly disturbed at the turn of events, "But she has a good heart. In fact, she was the one that credited you with stopping the noise complaints, and if you actually did something atrocious, she's not subtle in letting you know…"

"Once again, I'll consider it," Kazuma stated, albeit a bit more reluctantly this time.

"Good," Wiz smiled, "Now, I'm going to offer you the Uk 59 for 49,000 and the PBs for 10,000 at the moment. If you guys struck a deal, I'll reduce it to 38,000 and 8000 respectively."

Kazuma and Aqua looked at each other for a moment. Not so much in thought, more so in 'We should blame each other if something goes wrong'.

"…k" Kazuma finally managed.

"Wonderful! Now, firearms aside, you're going to need the proper clothing as well…"

Twenty minutes later Aqua and Kazuma walked out the store, dressed in flecktarn*, khakis, boots and ammunition pouches. Each had a pistol in their holster, with Aqua carrying their new 'hunting rifle'. The two looked more like soldiers ready to enter a warzone rather than game hunters with the gear, but a wise man always stated, 'You never know'…

"Hey, Kazuma?" Aqua asked.

"Yes, I'm Kazuma."

"…How do you load this thing?"

"That's easy, all you do is look for the charging handle*, and…" Kazuma faltered, upon noticing that there was no visible charging handle on the gun.

"…Shit"

…..

Items Acquired:

1x Uk vz. 59

550x 7.62x54mmR (in 50 round boxes)

2x PB pistol

160x 9x18mm (With ten 8-round magazines)

Various pieces of obsolete surplus kit

Items Lost:

84,800Ks

* * *

**Some random technical stuff explained, denoted with a star (You can skip these if you want)-**

**Tape-on clock in the car: The Skoda 120L did not have an interior clock, it was added in a higher trim**

**Clutch 'engaging': Biting point of the clutch, this is when the engine starts to send power to the wheels, and where most people stall the car**

**'neutral-throttle-shift-throttle': Proper term is 'double-clutching' (apologies for the direct description monstrosity)**

**Side-sweeping: When you take a gun, point it forwards and swing it from side to side. A big no-no due to the fact you might accidentally shoot someone**

**400m headshots with the SKS: Technically speaking not possible in the real world (the manufacturing processes on them were quite loose which caused dispersion problems), used more to emphasize Kazuma's luck**

**8mm rifle: 8x57mm IS, the post-WW2 designation of the German 7.92x57mm Mauser. Additionally, the CZ 550 came in many calibers**

**Flecktarn: The Bundeswehr's (Modern German Army) flecktarn pattern is one of the cheapest camouflages on the market, and can be seen frequently in surplus stores or on 'armed civilians' around the world**

**The charging handle: A unique thing about the Uk 59 is that the pistol grip (Where the trigger is) doubles as the charging handle**

**….**

**Notes: Yes, Aqua/the group isn't causing enough trouble this chapter. But seeing that they have a new 'hunting rifle', it's only a matter of time before something goes sour…**

**Additionally, Chris/Eris was originally supposed to be here, but I figured that her presence wouldn't make much sense for this chapter (As from what I remembered, Chris/Eris befriending Darkness was more of a personal favor as a result of her devoutness/Eris' need for a Crusader joining her faith).**

**As always, please leave a review! :)**

**Once again, credits to H3ctic. for taking his time to Beta this… :)**


	5. Moving Targets

**AN: H3ctic. Helped edited this chapter. Credits to him! :)**

**New Objective: Hunting**

* * *

(30 Minutes earlier)

Kazuma, Aqua and Megumin met up with Darkness the next morning at the cafeteria, mainly to discuss a few things about their living conditions. It was starting to get cramped (it was only a two bedroom unit, and Megumin already took the couch), meaning that Darkness would have to sleep on the floor.

She accepted the living conditions, but refused the conditions that she had to pay the rent of 3500Ks, mainly due to her financial assets being frozen from the paperwork error.

"How about I offer you my services instead?" Darkness stated.

"What type of services exactly?" Kazuma asked, subtly gazing towards her chest again.

"I'm an armed contractor, and I fought in Iraq before," she elaborated, "I can keep your group safe in these hard times."

'This seems like a good deal,' Kazuma thought. He looked at his other roommates, both of which looked to agree with the terms.

"Alright, we accept," Kazuma stated, shaking her hand, "Although may I ask why you want to provide those services? Because we _did_ have a bad run in with the chedaki after all…"

"Kazuma!" Aqua whispered harshly, making Kazuma realise his choice of words.

"That just makes it even better!" Darkness blurted out, slamming a hand on the table as she started panting, "The chedaki have always been notorious for their record of brutality, and being captured will surely result in a humiliating fate for someone like me… That alone makes the job worthwhile!"

"…I'm going to pretend I didn't hear that," Kazuma stated, sharing the looks of confusion with Aqua and Megumin.

"Besides, my task is to prevent innocent citizens like you!"

'She seems awfully eager to get into it… Are contractors not in it for money only?'

"Honestly, we all hope your services won't be needed," Kazuma stated, albeit more reluctantly than before, "But otherwise my group seems happy to have you-"

"Thank you Kazuma!" Darkness exclaimed again, taking the poor lad back into her marshmallow hell again.

'She is soft, but why does it have to be like this?' Kazuma thought, raising his hands in surrender. Mainly so he can breathe again…

(Later…)

Darkness had agreed to go hunting with Kazuma that day, as part of 'offering her services'. After a half hour window of everyone getting properly dressed and geared, they would head out. The group talked about leaving Megumin behind, but she managed to convince them to take her along as she stated that being left behind is the greatest insult to a team member, which caused everyone to relent.

The group had reached the town at around 9 AM, much slower than expected given the amount of hills the car needed to traverse. Apparently the Skoda really doesn't like inclines (especially with four people crammed inside with all their guns), and it made a dull groaning sound from the motor as they struggled to get past 30km/h. The occasional tractor didn't help matters either, as passing them was a chore given how the sedan was only slightly faster than them when going up a hill.

The hunting area in question was a town named Chuderov, some ten kilometers north of their hometown. Despite the agricultural allegations, the town looked rather modern, with a small housing block and commercial area. Surprisingly enough, there was even a car dealership around, and they had a number of new BMW cars parked in the lot.

'Who buys BMWs in the middle of nowhere, anyways?' Kazuma thought as he left the car. They had found an unoccupied dirt patch to leave the vehicle.

Aqua had agreed to carry the Rachot*, as Kazuma stated that it was too heavy for him to carry all the time. In return, they had to split a third of the earnings with the goddess, as 'good pack mules do not work for free'. In turn, Kazuma had to carry six of the 50-round boxes for the machine gun, but the boy primarily complained at the logic of taking all 550 bullets with them to go hunting.

Darkness was offered to borrow Aqua's PB for defensive purposes, an offer which she had turned down. This is due to Darkness possessing a huge arsenal at hand, even for a private military contractor. For this instance, the storage cases she brought in the car contained an M4A1 rifle with a futuristic looking scope*, and a USP .45 as her sidearm. Additionally, she had taken various pieces of field gear on her person such as hand grenades, smoke bombs, a bulletproof vest and even an M320 grenade launcher. She still claimed that this wasn't the entire arsenal, and that the rest was with Wiz, much to everyone's disbelief. She could obtain an arsenal of prohibited weapons that large, yet she can't obtain proper paperwork…

All of this firepower was rather overkill for the mission at hand: They were to clear out a portion of the forested area behind the farmlands of the town. The main issue was with the brown bears strewing the trash around, and livestock being attacked by foxes and wolves. To a lesser extent, deer were damaging the crops as they were still growing (It was around mid spring). The locals were insistent that the animals be kept relatively intact, and that they would pay them extra for doing so (Meat and hides).

The plan for the mission was fairly simple. Aqua would carry the Uk 59 into position (with as little noise as possible), while Kazuma would pick off any suspecting game with a few well placed shots. Darkness would be their backup in case something goes hairy, as she claims that her 'stopping methods'* would likely ruin any chance of the animal being used for meat or skin. Granted none of them had hunting experience, but they all figured that if they were quiet enough, it should work out…

"Hey! What about me?" Megumin complained, upon realising that her name was not included in the plans.

"You have the most important job of all," Kazuma started, trying to think of something useful to assign to the self proclaimed explosives expert, "You get to count tally of all the things we stack up!"

"Huh?" Megumin responded, with an utterly unimpressed expression.

"It's not so bad, in fact not even goddess Aqua can do that job correctly," Kazuma reminded her.

"Hey! I'm right here you know!" Aqua complained, "Anyone can count-"

"Yet you still overspent your pocket money by 200Ks the last time we went to the strip mall"

"But that's a different story!" Aqua cried, "It was Pilsen beer we were talking about, so it was worth the 310Ks overcharge!"

'I will get back to _this_ one later…' Kazuma mentally fumed.

"I am Megumin! The most powerful of Arch Wizards, I command only the most powerful of Explosion magic! I shall not take a second seat as the world plunges into chaos!" Megumin chanted to Kazuma, reaching into the back seat of the car and pulling out the M320*, "Besides, we still have an extra gun laying around…"

"Oi, don't point that around!" Kazuma exclaimed, trying to disarm Megumin as gently as possible, "Besides, Darkness owns that piece-"

"I can teach her how to use it," Darkness stated.

"I thought you were on my side, dammit!" Kazuma exclaimed.

"You know, people didn't fix dirty hands by not using them," Darkness elaborated, "But rather in teaching people how to wash them-"

With a dull 'pang', Kazuma heard something whiz past his left ear. At this, he turned around to see Megumin still holding the grenade launcher, although with some white smoke now coming out the barrel.

"…Whoops!" she blurted, as the grenade exploded a few hundred meters back.

….

Apparently, Darkness had 'forgotten' to unload the launcher. While she has indeed admitted to being clumsy at times in forgetting the safety, she also pointed out that she had a tendency of carrying things 'cocked and locked'* as a habit of sleeping in dangerous areas while on duty, something which has been carried over to the grenade launcher. Nonetheless, Megumin's little scuffle convinced Kazuma to let Darkness properly educate their fellow teammate on the weapon; if she can't control the habit of firing it, they might as well teach her how to do it safely…

As a result, they sidetracked away from the forest, taking time to find a fairly open area nearby that wasn't a farmer's field. There were a couple of trees here and there down the distance to use as targets as Darkness had Megumin fire off a few rounds with the butt stock and strap now installed onto the launcher.

"Alright, what do you do now?" Darkness stated as Megumin just fired off a grenade.

"Safety on," she repeated, flicking on the safety.

"Good, now what?"

"Unload," Megumin continued, popping open the breech to the side, ejecting the empty grenade casing.

"Continue…" Darkness said, handing over another 40mm grenade.

"…grenade in, breech locked…" Megumin mumbled, inserting the grenade and closing the breach.

"Mm…"

"…Safety off, and now… Explosion!"

With that she pressed the trigger, and the grenade was launched out the barrel with a dull 'pang'. It sailed out into the field for a few seconds before hitting the ground and exploding with a fairly loud bang, kicking up a small puff of white smoke and dust.

"Good stuff, you're getting the hang of this," Darkness smiled, handing Megumin another grenade as she properly repeated the loading process, "How about hitting that tree over there?"

"You got it!"

"Oi, aren't those things expensive?" Kazuma asked, noticing that Megumin had fired off almost a dozen grenades already.

"Sort of," Darkness shrugged, "Wiz sells them for around 400Ks normally, but I'm sure she'll give them to you for less… Plus we have a large stock still laying around"

"What if it runs out?"

"Won't be happening anytime soon, especially with Takistan right next door…"

"Huh? Takistan?" Kazuma questioned.

"Oh yeah, that's a country just west of Chernarus," Aqua elaborated, "They have large stocks of western military equipment even after the monarchy was deposed. Their economy is in a bit of a recession right now, and many soldiers sell their weapons to make ends meet…"

'So this whole region is plagued with bad financial decisions…'

"Say, I heard that ION was planning to extend their security contracts to Takistan as well…" Darkness remarked, while handing Megumin another grenade, "But either way, that's your last one for today… we still have a job at hand"

"You got it," Megumin remarked, setting the noob tube* down, "We still need to do this again sometime."

"Please don't," Kazuma pleaded to himself.

"Huh?"

"I mean, how long do those things last before they need to be replaced?"

"Personally speaking, the barrels get destroyed before they wear out*, so it's fine," Darkness shrugged, "Besides, we still have at least a few spare parts laying around with Wiz"

'This better not get out of hand…'

"Say Kazuma, we never got around how the gun works yesterday…" Aqua pointed out.

"…shit"

They were supposed to ask Wiz for help yesterday, something which had gone over their head as they were trying to nab some food and get a deal on cleaning materials.

"Huh? That's easy sauce…"

Depressing the latch on the pistol grip while squeezing the trigger, Darkness pushed the grip forwards, then backwards. Then she pulled the belt through the receiver until it made an audible click.

"…And now it's ready"

(break)

Weapons now ready (along with scratching a certain explosive expert's itch), the group now headed back towards the wooded area behind the farms. Apparently the farmers had some of their livestock stolen in the past few days, and wolves were spotted in the general direction they were travelling in. Luckily the brush wasn't too dense nor was the ground too muddy, making it easier to travel with less noise (and not alert any potential prey).

About ten minutes into the trek Kazuma signalled the group to stop. Through an open area in the tall grass, he spotted a group of around five wolves some fifty meters away, enjoying a meal of what appeared to be a farmer's pig. Darkness had already moved out the line towards another opening in the grass nearby.

"Megumin, stay back from this one," Kazuma ordered, gesturing towards a tree some fifteen meters back, "Aqua-"

The goddess seems to have taken matters into her own hands at the moment- being a short distance beside Kazuma, she had already taken aim at the first wolf she spotted and fired a three shot burst before proceeding to dump a good half of the belt into the other four while sweeping the gun a little. She appeared to have hit three of them, with the remaining two hurriedly running off at this intervention.

Kazuma immediately dropped to the ground, clutching his ears in pain. The gun barrel was too close, and a mix of the sound and the overpressure left his ears ringing like hell and his sense of balance slightly disorientated when he tried to stand up immediately.

"AQUA!" Kazuma shouted, retrieving the earplugs from his shirt pocket.

"WHAT?" Aqua returned, putting the gun down.

"WE FORGOT OUR EARPLUGS!"

"…WHAT?"

It looks like it was going to be a while before the goddess can hear again. Kazuma physically guided her to a nearby tree to have her sit down for now.

"Aqua, your earplugs!" he repeated again, pointing towards her shirt pockets and gesturing towards his ears.

"HUH? NO WAY!" Aqua shouted back, "I CAN HARDLY HEAR RIGHT NOW, THAT WOULD MAKE IT EVEN HARDER"

"Hey, could you guys tell her to put in her earplugs after her hearing comes back?" Kazuma sighed, gesturing towards Aqua for his teammates, to which they nodded.

"Also, get Megumin some protection too, I don't want her getting caught up with Aqua," Kazuma ordered, picking up the gun (As he felt that his hearing has returned enough to carry on), "I'll take her point from here…"

….

With that, Kazuma checked the wolves Aqua just shot. The first and second one received only one and three shots in the neck to body area, but the third one had at least eight holes in the body and the head was unidentifiable, meaning that they had to write this one off in terms of selling it (and probably use it as bait instead). After returning the other two carcasses to their 'safe area', Kazuma continued into the wooded area to continue their deed.

Five minutes of marching later yielded Kazuma getting caught into some waist height grass and thick brush. Kazuma cursed at his misfortune when he stepped on a twig, hearing sounds of grass and bush rustling in front of him. The sound probably scared off his prey, yet much to his surprise he saw a glimpse of something move at the edge of his peripheral vision. Quickly aiming at the opening in front of him, he proceeded to fire a burst, causing the brownish-red silhouette to fall out of his sight.

Gingerly making his way to where the color fell, Kazuma found a fairly large buck laying in the grass, if the antlers were to tell. It had received two shots to the head and one to the neck, with the rest of the body being intact. Kazuma smiled at his luck, but then quickly realised that he had to haul this back. He better get paid well for this, lugging the gun and seven boxes of ammunition through the forest was heavy enough as it was.

'I should probably get some help…' Kazuma thought as he got out of the shrub before hearing an ever familiar shriek from a particular goddess.

"Kazuma-san! Kazuma-san!" Aqua wailed in the distance, and although Kazuma wasn't able to see her he could tell that she was fairly close, "Please help, Kazuma!"

"What's going on-" Kazuma started, before seeing Aqua emerge through a small bush and a large brown blob behind her.

'Holy shit! Brown bear!'

Kazuma's heart raced. It was their first attempt at hunting and already they had run into one of the most dangerous animals for any hunter to encounter. Although this one did not appear to be chasing Aqua at full speed, it was still following her and it was huge, making it a threat regardless.

"Aqua! Don't run towards me, dammit!" Kazuma shouted as he tried to aim his gun, only to discover that Aqua was taking up most of his aiming work.

"Please, Kazuma! I'll treat you!"

'Like you ever had any consideration for spending my money…'

Quickly looking around, Kazuma saw a fairly tall rock, almost as tall as him. There was still some distance between him and Aqua, meaning that he had enough time to climb and take aim over the ever pitiful goddess. Besides, where was Darkness…?

"Aqua! Please slow down!" Darkness ordered, emerging from the bush a short moment later with Megumin, "I can't get a safe* shot off!"

"KAZUMAAA-"

At this point, Aqua had tripped on a log and fell face first into the grass just in front of the rock. Kazuma had already climbed the rock at this point and had a clear shot of the bear, while Darkness finally got a proper side shot. Kazuma held down the trigger until the gun clicked dry (Nearly knocking him over from the recoil force) while Darkness tried to get some follow up from the side. Granted Kazuma did a very un-recommended move in terms of proper fire control, but at that distance it was hard to miss.

Fortunately their efforts seemed to have worked, as the animal collapsed forwards onto Aqua in a heap.

"Oi! Aqua!"

The group was now trying to dig their fellow goddess out of the carcass. With everyone pulling, they were able to create enough free space to allow Aqua to crawl out from underneath. Unfortunately, she was covered in blood, given the amount of times the bear was shot and the fact that it collapsed right over her.

"T-thank you, Kazuma…" Aqua sobbed, pulling herself into the young man and burying her face into his shirt, "Thank you so much!"

'She smells disgusting!' Kazuma thought.

"You know, I wouldn't mind being covered with that stuff as well…"

"Huh?" Kazuma turned towards Darkness.

"Nothing!"

(Later)

The group decided to head back to the town given the turn of events. Aqua was completely soaked in gore (a portion of which was shared with Kazuma), and they had no means of recovering even the deer from the brush. They might as well tell the town-folk where they left their hunt, as they were not collecting it for themselves anyways.

"I'm a goddess, and look at how I've been defiled!" Aqua complained, trying to wipe her hands off with the few clean spots on her pants, "If the Axis faith members see me, I'll surely lose their support!"

'Axis faith? Was that some cult of hers?' Kazuma thought, 'Besides, Aqua is literally the last person to be commended for godliness…'

"Huh? Axis faith?" Both Megumin and Darkness asked in a confused tone.

"Yeah, she gets carried away like that, don't mind her…"

"But it's true!"

Luckily for Kazuma, the group seemed to not buy into Aqua's banter and was trying not to snicker. Aqua grumbled in defeat at the fact she wasn't believed.

Nearing the village, Kazuma paused as he got a glimpse through the path leading up to the road. There was a green jeep parked in the roadway with a poorly spray-painted black and red star, with two masked men wearing green and white camouflage idling nearby. Both of them were armed with what appeared to be Kalashnikov style rifles, and there were a small group of villagers kneeled over next to them.

"Kazuma? What's wrong?" Aqua asked.

"There's two armed men in the way," Kazuma whispered matter of factly, "And it appears that they are holding some villagers hostage or something…"

"Let me check it out…" Darkness stated, peeking out towards the roadway. Her eyes widened at the sight.

"This is not good," she whispered to the group, "It looks like they're about to execute those villagers or something."

Kazuma's eyes widened, "What? Why?"

"I don't know, but the most common excuse for such an event occurring is that they're partisans," Darkness shook her head, "I've seen this happen before, and it won't be pretty…"

"What should we do?"

"We should take them out," she declared while taking aim, "Kazuma, you get the one on the left, I'll get the right one. If we're quick, they won't-"

Once again, Aqua decided to take matters into her own hands, charging out of the bush before everyone was ready. The two gunmen had noticed her presence by now, and turned their attention away from the villagers by now. Aqua was faster, and while her aim was off, she managed to put two shots into the one on the left, causing him to drop his weapon as he fell to the ground. Darkness had followed up to Aqua by now, and popped a few shots into the second man, and despite not hitting him, caused him to flee.

"Aqua, what the heck was that?!" Kazuma scolded. They weren't even done the plan and she already jumped to action…

"I thought I was helping out!"

'I swear she will be the end of us one day or another…'

The villagers got up, grateful that they were rescued. They had told them that the chedaki had arrived in a truck and several jeeps, some of which had mounted heavy weapons. They had also told them that the militia groups were on the way to relieve the town, and that if they could join in the action right now they could prevent much of the town's resources from being pillaged (along with being rewarded for their efforts).

"Very well," Darkness stated in comprehension, "Kazuma, the guy over there dropped his weapon. You should probably take it as an increase for firepower…"

"And Megumin, take these," Darkness continued, pulling out a few more 40mm grenades, "If they try to grab you or something, just shoot them with the launcher. They won't explode at close range, and it's like hitting them with an extreme fastball*. Got it?"

Megumin nodded, understanding the seriousness of the situation as she pocketed the shots. Kazuma was a bit uneasy, but still armed himself with the carbine (AKS-74U) on the fallen enemy, along with cramming three of the magazines into the pouches on his waist.

"Let's move"

**Objective Cancelled: Hunting**

**New Objective: Eliminate the ChDKZ* presence in the town**

The group split in two, at opposite sides of the road. They moved quickly until they got to near the town, taking cover in a nearby bush. From here they had a view of the west road entering the town, which an open topped machine gun jeep was driving down and into the town.

"I got the gunner, you get the driver!" Kazuma ordered, taking aim.

"Mhm!"

Aqua had immediately started firing into the hull of the jeep upon hearing this. The jeep machine-gunner was unable to spot them immediately, but still fired a few bursts into the general direction where the gunfire was coming from. Kazuma managed to shut him down with a quick burst, causing him to collapse back into the jeep as it continued driving into another parked car down the road.

"We should make our way across to the car," Kazuma reminded, looking around before walking onto the road, "Stay alert"

"Here they come…!" Aqua shouted, resting the machine gun bipod on a nearby parked car.

A group of maybe seven or so masked men was now approaching down the road, probably going to investigate what happened to the jeeps, or having received the message from the one guy that escaped from the jeep earlier. Aqua had already started clattering away with the Uk 59, forcing the group to break up behind the few parked cars at the T-intersection. Darkness took the opportunity to move up into an alley and off the road, taking cover behind the building's wall.

"Megumin, get into the other alley!" Kazuma barked, grabbing the girl's hand as he moved forwards, "We need to get off the street!"

The opposing squad had began to return fire at this point, with the distinct clatter of the AK-47 rifle and the occasional sharp cracking of the more modern AK-74, although he did also hear several distinctive pops of something similar to a lower caliber weapon like the PM. Kazuma felt a concrete fragment ricochet sharply off his leg, prompting him to shove Megumin into the alley as he hastily dove forwards. Being unsure if he was safe or not, Kazuma crouched deeper into the alley than he probably should have, given how loud the 'crack' was when the bullets flew past his position. He peeked out again to fire his carbine when he noticed that Darkness was firing short bursts at the enemy, determining that the attention was now directed towards the contractor now. It was now that he noticed that the enemy was firing somewhat erratically, with at least three of them seeming to be frantically sweeping their rifles around on full auto.

Aqua had just gotten ready to fire again, given that she had burned through a box of 7.62 already, and managed to strike one of them in the leg in the first burst as the round penetrated the car, producing a pronounced streak of crimson. The man collapsed onto the ground, screaming in pain at the wound inflicted.

"Aqua, move up to that other car!" Darkness ordered, gesturing towards the vehicle, "Kazuma and I will cover!"

"Got it!"

Both Kazuma and Darkness fired quick bursts, peeking out the wall and back. Once the clatter from the machine gun came up again, Darkness quickly reloaded her rifle and ran to the next available form of cover, this time a yellow fire hydrant next to a chain linked patch of grass. Kazuma took aim again, now steadying his aim against the wall as he fired a burst at a man popping up from behind the car hood, and while the rounds merely got absorbed into the front end of the vehicle, it forced his opponent to keep his head down. He had comprehended the general idea of their plan: they were keeping the enemy down while they leap-frog continuously to the next form of cover.

"Moving!" Kazuma stated, as he got out of cover to move into the next alley.

Darkness merely nodded as she emptied her magazine before crouching back down to reload again. A few rounds had smattered into the steel structure, causing a jet of water to shoot out the top of the hydrant, effectively ruining her ability to return fire from cover. Aqua had managed to dump another box of ammunition in the meantime into one of the cars, causing steam and hot gases to start to rise from the trunk. This forced one of the men behind it to run into the open in panic, as a natural response of not wanting to get burned. Kazuma managed to get a shot off him, dropping him onto the ground. The enemy squad appeared to have had enough by now, and hastily started to retreat down the street.

"They're falling back! Let's move!" Darkness barked, standing up from the fire hydrant, "Watch the houses!"

Everyone cautiously moved out of cover, with Kazuma loading another fresh magazine into the weapon receiver. They moved quickly towards the car Aqua just skewered, but still paid attention to the windows in the buildings for any possible movement. Megumin had just past a bakery's front window when Kazuma saw some green move behind the window reflection.

"Megumin! Look out!" Kazuma warned, aiming his weapon.

Darkness was quick to catch on, quickly lunging at Megumin to get her down. Kazuma had already steadied a burst towards the suspecting figure, shattering the glass and apparently hitting his weapon in the receiver as he saw metal sparks coming from his hand. Either way, he was forced to abandon his weapon and flee through the back of the store.

"Thank you, Darkness," Megumin said, brushing off the dust on her shirt and readjusting the grenade launcher slung over her shoulder.

The group quickly moved to the road perpendicular to theirs at the intersection, not wanting to pursue the enemy as they were too on the edge. They were passing through the town center when they noticed the truck parked in front of the entrance to the car dealership, once again with the distinctive black and red star embalmed onto the doors and hood of the vehicle.

Then a crack rang out, a bullet whizzing past Aqua's head, eliciting a shriek from the blood-stained goddess as she dove to prone.

"Sniper!" Darkness called out.

Kazuma saw it, a lens flare* as the sniper went back into cover behind one of the BMWs parked in the lot. Aqua was not going to have any of that after the near miss, and started to indiscriminately fire the Uk 59 into the parked cars, a notion which was shared by Darkness. Kazuma began to move into the lot with Darkness as Aqua started to reload again, but much to his surprise she began firing into the BMWs again, with a notable _bang_ coming from one of them by the time she dumped her second box.

"Kazuma, give me some more bullets!" Aqua called out, realising that she just loaded her last box and that her waist was now empty.

"You have to move up, dammit!" Kazuma retorted, waving at her, "And you gotta stop wasting your rounds!"

At this, the sniper cracked again, this time nearly hitting Megumin as he popped out over another car farther left from the entrance. The younger girl freaked out at this, cowering behind the truck as she fumbled for a grenade and loaded it into the launcher. She was still too shaken to pop out of cover to try and take a shot however, for obvious reasons.

"Megumin!" Kazuma shouted. He peppered the suspecting vehicle with a few bursts, forcing the sniper down again, "Aqua, move up!"

"Ok!"

Darkness was now moving down the lot, trying to catch the sharpshooter while he was moving. Aqua had made a sprint towards the car Kazuma took cover behind, with the young man handing her another three boxes latched onto his waist. Megumin started to crawl from the truck, breathing deeply.

"EXPLOSION!"

'!'

In a move that surprised everyone, Megumin started a sprint towards the car adjacent to Kazuma. She had fired off the grenade just as the sniper was peering up, and while it didn't hit him, it struck the electrical transformer nearby when it exploded. In a bright plume and a loud bang, the transformer blew up in a size of spectacular proportions, the flame momentarily spreading enough to torch the two cars nearby while the shockwave of the blast knocked the sniper over. This was followed up by Aqua dumping another box of 7.62 into the car that their opponent was taking cover behind before they finally saw a pair of hands being raised, indicating that the sniper has finally surrendered.

"Kazuma! What's going on?!" a familiar voice called out.

"Wiz?"

Surely enough, Wiz had shown up with a few masked men, along with some civilians coming to inspect the carnage. Kazuma felt a moment of relief, given that the men weren't firing at them, help had finally arrived. They were saved!

"What are you doing here, Wiz?" Kazuma questioned. He knew that she owned a sporting store, but he did not expect to see her here…

"I was called up as the chedaki was attacking again," she explained, "But it seems like you guys took care of it well. The rest surrendered when the militia showed up…"

"We did it Kazuma!" Aqua cheered, pumping a hand into the air, "We saved the town!"

"Yeah!"

Kazuma was less excited about this. What was supposed to be a simple hunting trip ended up in a carnage that costed much in terms of property damage and casualties. He just hoped that he wouldn't have to pay for all of this…

….

Final tally:

1x man killed (ChDKZ)

6x men injured (ChDKZ)

10x men captured (ChDKZ)

3x wolves killed

1x deer killed

1x bear killed

3x BMW 3 series destroyed

5x BMW 3 series damaged

2x Toyota Hilux destroyed

9x Toyota Hilux damaged

1x Skoda 130L destroyed

3x UAZ-469 damaged

Undetermined amounts of property/real estate damaged/destroyed

Items acquired:

1x AKS-74U

77x 5.45x39mm rounds

Final verdict: We win(?)

(break)

**More Technical aspects (Denoted with star, *. Can be skipped):**

**-Rachot: Nickname for Uk 59**

**-Futuristic scope: More specifically, the Light Weapon Thermal Sight, an infrared scope designed and produced by EOTech, the creators of the Holosight.**

**-Stopping methods: Most of the times, it's shoot to stop, not to kill. Darkness is a 'wall' in the original series, intended on stopping/blocking the enemy. The combat mechanics here are obviously different, but the prospect remains; as a result, Darkness would not have many hits/kills/etc. here, with primary intention of 'stopping' the enemy. Classic Darkness moments will still appear from time to time, however**

**-M320: The M320 is able to be used as a standalone grenade launcher, unlike the older M203**

**-Cocked and locked: Originated from the M1911 pistol, where a round is loaded in the chamber, hammer in the fire position but the safety is on. When the safety is off, the weapon is immediately ready to fire**

**-Noob tube (I'm sure most people here already know this): An under-barrel grenade launcher attachment, gaining controversy with the Call of Duty: Modern Warfare series for its ease of use**

**-Wearing out: I couldn't find a specified barrel life on the grenade launchers, but I have heard that the launchers themselves wear out before the barrels needed to be replaced (if you can find a specific figure please let me know)**

**-Safe shot: Mainly to avoid an overpenetration and hitting an unintended target (In this case, Aqua)**

**-Extreme Fastball: The M433 grenade weighs one and a half times that of a baseball, and travels roughly twice as fast as the average fastball (I'm assuming 87.5 mph), making it around 6 times more powerful (If we use kinetic energy formula E=0.5*(Mass)*(Velocity)^2). Nasty stuff if it hits something**

**-ChDKZ: Abbreviation for Chedaki**

**-Lens flare: When a rifle scope is used in daytime, this can happen. The resulting flash of light emitted gives away the sniper's position.**

…**.**

**Other Notes: Darkness will be more like Darkness soon enough (With the combat and masochism). Additionally, I just want to clarify again that Chris will likely show up in the future (After an inquiry on the Notes last chapter), along with other potentially interesting characters. Once again, they may be tweaked a bit to fit in.**

**In regards to NanoKnight1's comment: They will obtain a proper rifle of sorts later on, along with more powerful/modern weapons in general to cause more chaos… :)**

**Once again, please review!**


	6. Detour

**Credit Disclaimer: H3ctic. Helped edited this chapter. Credits to him… :)**

* * *

'Debt, debt, debt… Coupons? Debt…'

Kazuma was flipping through the letters dropped into the mail slot, mainly reminding them of the debt they had racked up as a result of the destruction caused. Aqua had taught him the hard way that BMWs were not cheap in this world. Even if they only had to pay for the destroyed BMWs, the ones they destroyed retailed for around $28,000 USD, meaning that they owed (at least) a staggering 1.8 million Kronas.

"This sucks!" Aqua pouted, pounding the table with her hands, "They should be thanking us for saving them! But now they have the audacity to demand compensation from their very saviors!"

Aqua was correct on that aspect, and strangely the auto dealership in question did not buy insurance for their vehicles because 'it costed too much'… Yet they still have the audacity to open shop in a warzone, where there was bound to be fighting and hostile individuals hell bent on robbing their possessions.

'Who can afford those vehicles anyways, especially in a farmer village?' Kazuma grumbled mentally.

"Can I blow them up? Can I?" Megumin stated flatly as she was cleaning the barrel of the M320 with a can of WD40.

"Please don't,"

The last thing they needed was a murder charge along with the debt. In hindsight, it may have been a better idea to feed that store owner to the wolves, literally and figuratively…

"So this is all we earned?" Darkness questioned, with a small pile of money on the table.

"Looks like it,"

They were paid around 200,000Ks for their efforts in the town, mainly for their quick reactions- if they had waited for the militia, the chedaki would have stolen all of the vehicles in the auto dealership along with a good portion of their farm harvest, making their war efforts even stronger and potentially causing a food shortage. The hunting had paid much less than they expected however, with bagging a kill amounting to roughly 400Ks, along with an additional 300Ks bonus if the animal was salvageable. The only redeeming part was the bear kill for 2000Ks, given that it was responsible for an animal attack in the past.

On a sidenote, they had discovered that Wiz had connections with the National Party, with her appearance in the village. Knowing that Darkness was friends with her, it was at least reassuring they had some potential friends, or at least people who weren't outright trying to kill them…

"Heh… we risked our lives only to get placed into crippling debt instead,"

"That's the great part!" Darkness exclaimed, jumping up from her chair, "We get threatened with eviction from our home, and in order to make our ends meet, you're going to force me to sell my body to the beasts down at-"

Everyone gave the blonde a weird look at this. It appears that their debt was no longer the most serious issue at hand…

"Huh? Did I say something weird?"

'Damn it all, looks like she is just hopeless…'

"…Anyways, we can't pay everything we have, as we still need a house for now," Kazuma elaborated, glaring at Darkness as she started to blush a little.

"We can all work at my restaurant, the manager is still looking for positions," Aqua suggested, raising a hand.

"You can't be serious Aqua," Kazuma sighed, "You only get paid 15,000Ks a month, and even if we all worked there it would take more than two and a half years to pay it off, and that's without us eating or you drinking us dry…"

"What does my drinking have anything to do with that?" Aqua answered incredulously, "I need my alcohol hard and plentiful in order for me to sleep peacefully at night!"

"And that's exactly the problem," Kazuma continued, "You're drinking away our funds faster than the Hindenburg deflating on a good day*,"

"You're so mean, Kazuma!" Aqua cried, "Does my sleeping bother you that much?"

"It wouldn't have if it didn't drain our funds that much…"

"Meanie!"

"Even if she does drink, I think you're being a little harsh on her…" Megumin stated.

"Nonsense, he should keep his harshness as it is!" Darkness stated in an excited tone, extending her arms, "He can unleash it on me instead, so the harsher the better!"

"Hell no, I don't want to clog the walking toilet with verbal diarrhea…"

"Kuh! You just don't have any mercy do you?" Darkness moaned, swinging her head as she hugged herself.

Kazuma sighed. There was something wrong with their new contractor after all, as to his suspicions. Looks like everything has its drawbacks…

"We're going to need faster ways of earning money…"

….

On a piece of cloth, Darkness laid a wooden rifle on the table, and a scope on the side. It appeared to have signs of use, but otherwise appeared to be cared for.

"What is that?" Kazuma notched an eyebrow, "And where did we get it?"

"It's a G43, and it's authentic," Darkness elaborated, pointing towards the swastika and eagle stamped on the receiver, "It was dropped by the sniper we took down. We should sell some things in order to make ends meet…"

"That's a great idea," Kazuma said, his eyes lighting up as he grabbed the M320, "We just need to-"

"Don't sell my Chunchunmaru, damnit!" Megumin protested, trying to get the launcher back, "We've been through so much together!"

"Damn that, it's because of those grenades those cars were destroyed!"

"Kazuma, how about this instead?" Darkness pulled out a newspaper, pointing at the posting on the page, "We're bound to run out of things to sell, after all!"

'Escorts Wanted'

"NO, DAMMIT!" Kazuma cried out, ripping up the newspaper in a bout of frustration.

(a few days later)

As per Darkness' suggestions (Disregarding the sexual portions for obvious reasons), the group decided on selling items to pay off their debt. Aqua had claimed that she was going to get another job to supplement her income, one that would enable her to work away from customer service as she was frankly tired of the manager and customers yelling at her for things beyond her control.

As the group went with the plan of selling things, Megumin had convinced Kazuma to drive her to the university in the capital, where she can 'repossess' some hand grenades that were supposed to be refurbished. Apparently many of them get written off, so it comes to no surprise that some of the items were gone from the storage (as they were assumed to be disposed of). Wiz stated that she was willing to trade with them, and while she did not specify a cash value she claimed that they were in short supply, meaning that they could get a good cut out of a trade.

The trip there was largely uneventful, taking about three hours of drive and a fifteen minute wait before Megumin came back with three boxes of grenades from the engineering department. The boxes also came with a separate batch of fuses, as they were the primary culprit for the devices not working (and which the participating students were supposed to rectify). Surprisingly, they were stopped by an officer at this time, but only to inquire about their vehicle license- he quickly let them go after he saw their license plate registration, which was not from the capital (he did remind them to bring bribes in case they were caught again, however).

Halfway back however, the car started to sputter and finally stall out. Kazuma tried to restart the engine, to no avail. He put the hazard lights on and got out of the car.

"What happened?" Megumin questioned, following along, "Are we stuck here?"

"If we can't fix it, then yes," Kazuma stated, popping open the trunk* to observe the engine compartment, "Now what do we have here…"

As the town was small, many of his days were spent either hiking around or reading whatever he could get his hands on to kill the boredom from the unemployment (and lack of internet). He had comprehensively studied his vehicle's owner manual, and was hoping that Aqua's boost to his technical knowledge was enough for him to get the vehicle back working.

'The car sputtered and stopped, and nothing seems out of order under the hood…' Kazuma thought. Maybe this wouldn't be a difficult fix after all…

Removing the feed line into the carburetor*, Kazuma took out the fuel can from the back seat (It was purchased a few days earlier as he was worried that there were not enough gas stations along the roads) and filled the plastic bottle in his cup holder. Using a ripped up juice box as a funnel, he poured a bit of fuel into where the feed line used to be. Surely enough, the engine started up when he turned the ignition. Now came the question of topping up the fuel…

"Megumin!" Kazuma called, "We need your Arch Wizard skills to help the car move. Now just take a seat over by the trunk and top up the carburetor with this can and funnel here…"

"Huh? No way!" Megumin immediately complained, "I'm not going to sit outside handling gas while you get to sit in a proper seat! That's not how you treat a girl!"

"Luckily for you, I'm an advocate of gender equality," Kazuma faux cackled in an evil tone, "Besides, I don't think you can reach the pedals anyways…"

"Huh?"

Megumin moved into the driver seat, and indeed had some trouble reaching the pedals, but can still press them.

"See? I can drive…"

'Damn it, I thought the poor ergonomics would help me this time…'

"What about manual?"

"…"

Eventually, they reached a compromise- Kazuma would drive for this time. He stressed this as comeuppance for 'blowing up the BMWs', something which Megumin had refused to accept. In return however, Megumin would learn to drive Kazuma's car and have it to drive for any three days she desired. Kazuma was mainly concerned that her 'explosion' tendencies would extend to the car if it were in her hands, along with his dread of their goddess banging the gears…

"Kazuma, please slow down!" Megumin cried, "I can't hold on at this speed!"

Kazuma grumbled in frustration, but still reduced the speed. They were barely going past 20 kilometers per hour yet they were still running into trouble, with Megumin nearly being flung into a tree when he was making a sharp turn half an hour ago. It was going to take a good few hours for them to get home, for something that shouldn't have taken more than an hour…

"Ok… that's good!"

The car started to sputter again, meaning that the carburetor was going to be empty soon and that the engine was going to stall. They had stalled well over five times already, and Kazuma was afraid of busting the starter at this rate (Something which he was not equipped to fix at hand).

"Megumin! Top up the carburetor! We're going to stall again!"

"Huh? Got it…" she returned, topping up again and stopping the sputtering.

(two hours later)

"Dear god… Never again…"

It started to rain for the last part of the trip, forcing both of them to get wet for the next hour (As Kazuma had to keep the window open to yell at Megumin when she forgot to top up the carburetor). This was followed by a rash evasive maneuver on Kazuma's behalf, as he swerved to avoid a reckless driver, accidentally forcing Megumin to drop into the mud in the roadside drainage ditch (And stalling the car again when he got out to look for her). But none of that mattered- they were home now, meaning that they can get dry and clean again.

Climbing up to the fifth floor and approaching his unit, he heard an apparently intense dialogue going on inside.

"-I can't take it!" A voice ragged, sounding to be Darkness.

"-cred create water!" Another voice, this one sounding like it belonged to Aqua.

"Kyaaah!" At that, an audible thud was heard.

'This cannot end well, is it?'

The first thing that Kazuma noticed was an opened box on the floor, with bubble wrap strewn everywhere. Then he noticed Aqua sitting next to what appears to be a pair of telephones by the table, with Darkness passed out on the floor. He had also taken note that Darkness was blushing and smiling deliriously, with drool coming out of her mouth. Something tells him that the situation was grave again…

Aqua noticed Kazuma at this moment, and quickly pressed a button on the phone (presumably the speaker button), "Oh no! Your wife and kids just walked in on you jerking off!"

There was a loud _clang_ at the other end of the line, presumably by the person dropping their phone. This was followed up by a series of a woman screaming a list of profanities before the line finally went silent. At this, Aqua started to laugh hysterically as she placed the phone down, much to Kazuma's immediate confusion.

"Aqua! What is the meaning of this?" Kazuma barked, pointing towards the passed out contractor. Despite his disdain for her masochistic tendencies, he was still unwilling to throw her under the bus, for whatever the hell just happened.

"Why is it always my fault, Kazuma?" Aqua quipped, wiping away some of her tears from the laughing, "Darkness and I just found a job and this is how you congratulate us?"

"I'm going to take a bath…" Megumin stated, trying to excuse herself as she realised that things were going downhill.

"Well she's all flustered and passed out, so something is obviously wrong!" Kazuma retorted, "And what job?"

"We get paid to answer phone calls from customers!"

'Huh? Is Darkness that excited about verbal abuse from customer service? But what was that thing about jerking off?'

"So you guys just went out to get more minimum wage jobs?"

"No Kazuma, why do you always consider us as wage slaves?" Aqua retorted, wagging a finger, "This one is special, we get paid 10Ks per minute for these calls!"

Kazuma raised an eyebrow at this. That was equivalent to about 600Ks per hour, and if Aqua and Darkness were working together for eight hours a day, they could pay off their debt at around 8 months. It literally sounded too good to be true…

"What is this place, anyways?" Kazuma questioned, "Because I heard something about 'jerking off' and 'Sacred create water'. Not to mention how Darkness looked all excited and stuff…"

"Terms and employment…" Aqua produced a paper, which Kazuma started to read immediately.

"…"

"Huh? What's wrong?"

"COCKROACH-SAMA!" Kazuma shouted, using her legal surname again, "WHY DID YOU GUYS APPLY TO A PHONE SEX HOTLINE?!"

"We didn't know that it was until I got to the interview! I thought it was just a 'casual conversation' thing!" Aqua cried, "Besides, I decided to just go through with the interview, because I was already there"

(three hours earlier)

"So… what experience do you have in making these phone calls?" interviewer asked, each word dripping with suggestiveness.

The two applied for the job openings, upon hearing that it was merely talking to customers and keeping them satisfied (And the fact that it required no paperwork on Darkness' side). Of course, the sexual innuendo simply flew over their heads, even as the interviewer was talking…

"Oh, I have plenty," Darkness stated confidently, "When I was five years old I'd call my grandma and talk with her for three hours straight."

Aqua looked on with confusion as their interviewer laughed like a velociraptor. They still ended up with the jobs however, when Darkness 'got her act together' upon realising what type of a position they were applying to. She had reasoned about how she doesn't mind being abused by difficult customers (something which would be good for business), while elaborating how Aqua's water knowledge of water would create interesting situations to exploit. They ended up getting their own call extensions (And home phone numbers) by the end of their efforts, regardless.

…

"I can't believe we actually applied for something like that," Aqua stated flatly as they were sitting by their telephones, waiting for their first call.

"Neither did I, but it was a pleasant surprise indeed," Darkness stated as she hugged herself, shuddering with excitement, "Just getting insulted at all day by frustrated young men, because of your inexperience on the job…"

"…"

Aqua just stared at Darkness. Sometimes it was too awkward, even for her. That wasn't even including her speech on how phone sex operators were doing a noble cause, as they would be plugging the holes in delivering 'spicy' content to people without internet…

At this, the phone began to ring, indicating their first customer. With some hesitation, Aqua and Darkness answered the call.

"Who is this?" a voice on the line husked. It sounded like he was breathing heavily, and oddly… familiar? It almost reminded Aqua of her manager…

"This is Aq- I mean Squirt God," Aqua quickly corrected, switching over to her 'job title', "How can I help you today?"

Aqua was more than a bit nervous at this. She had no idea if she was handling the means correctly, mainly because there was nothing 'exciting' in heaven after all as a form of comparison. She felt that she wasn't being paid enough for this…

"I was told there were two women on this end, where is the other?" the man demanded.

"Oh, uh…" Aqua stammered, looking over at Darkness (Who was getting way too excited for her own good), "Meloness is still in the basement right now, because she's not ready,"

"Just getting into business right off the bat? I like that!"

"So… how can I help you today?" Aqua continued, trying to recite some lines from a telemarketer movie she saw once.

"You see, there's this new kid around town, and everywhere he goes there's these two beauties following him around," the man ordered, "One has blue hair while the other is a blonde. I want to be that kid for this round just to know what I'm missing out on,"

"You got it, now give me a second to get Meloness out of the basement,"

"Don't take too long, these calls are expensive dammit!"

Aqua covered her speaker for a second, taking a moment to wipe the sweat from her brow. This was far too uncomfortable for her. Yet it was probably the least of her concerns right now, as Darkness appeared that she was ready to burst at any moment. It did give her an idea however…

"Darkness!" Aqua bellowed, "Darkness, put the phone down for a second, I have an idea…"

"What's going on?" Darkness questioned, still breathing deeply and blushing over the interaction, "I thought we were going to get abused by that stud on the end of the phone…"

Aqua rolled her eyes, in spite of her good standings with Darkness she was not interested in trying to deal with the inconvenient bursts of masochism right now. She gave Darkness a quick overview of the situation, explaining how her jerk-ass manager had a pay dispute with her, effectively reducing her paycheck by half. She also elaborated that he was probably home along with his wife, and that his reason for calling was probably because his wife had 'blocked' him again (She claimed to have known this from his outbursts at work due to his temper problems, whether it was his wife visiting or an employee stepping out of line). She then stated that they could get back at him by causing him to lose his temper on the phone, thereby drawing his wife's attention over and catching him in the act.

"As much as I enjoy getting hit and insulted, this is one of the few moments I want to hit back," Darkness said, clenching a fist, "That man's treachery will have to stop with my party members…"

"Alright, then get ready," Aqua replied, to which Darkness nodded in acknowledgement.

"Alright, we're back," Aqua reminded her manager on the other end, "It took me a while to find a proper name tag for Meloness here,"

"Master, look at my new dog collar!" Darkness rasped. It was hard to tell if she was turned on by the remark, was incredibly good at acting, or a mix of both…

"Obedient and subservient, just like how it was supposed to be,"

"Indeed, she's now ready for your banana," Aqua coughed, trying to wash down that previous line. It made Kazuma's mean streak look like choir children, as their party leader was at least an egalitarian when it came to his degeneracy…

"Heh… heheheh…" Darkness drooled, much to the concern of Aqua. She was getting too into it again, and too soon…

"That's right, it's not just any banana," Aqua said to Darkness with a faux chuckle, "Once you have it, your body will crave more of it, until you eventually can't go on without it…"

"J-Just give it to me already, dammit!" Darkness blurted out, probably being too deep in the act. The manager was audibly excited, as well…

"Relax Meloness, there's plenty of where that came from," Aqua 'reassured', deciding to go ahead with the killing blow to her manager's temperament, "Even though sweet bananas are rare, 11-mart only sells them for 80Ks per bundle. You can always have seconds with that when you're done…"

Even Darkness took a pause at Aqua's unexpected play. The line was silent for a moment before it exploded back into their ears.

"…WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS SHIT?!"

"Hnnngh!"

Darkness moaned so loudly at the backlash that even Aqua had to distance herself from the phone receiver due to the noise volume. There was a click on the end of the line, yet it did not appear that the call was ended…

'Bingo,' Aqua thought. That was probably his wife checking on the line to see what the noise was about. Looks like Darkness unintentionally outdid herself by blocking out the background noise and keeping the scumbag distracted…

"W-what an unexpected turn of events!" Darkness blurted quickly, seemingly with all restraints off, "Instead of offering me banana, he has decided to take out his frustrations on me with verbal insults instead!"

"…Huh?"

'Looks like even the manager is surprised at this development…'

"I can feel his breath down my neck, just threatening me with alcohol poisoning with his mere presence!" Darkness continued, "I don't know what type of weird foreplay this is, but this is absolutely fine as well!"

"…It looks like Meloness is having a bit of a moment again," Aqua said, in a mix of self-noting and trying to keep her opponent distracted, "I'll just use my magic and create some water, to help her snap out of it,"

"Don't do it, Squirt God! I can't take it!" Darkness bellowed, as indirect encouragement.

"Quiet! Sacred Create Water!"

"Kyaaaah!"

After exhausting her voice, Darkness collapsed dramatically onto the floor from her stool with a distinct _thud, _smiling deliriously in her self induced fantasy. All while Aqua's manager was listening to the development in a speechless stupor as his wife made her way up the stairs…

(present time)

"…and then you guys showed up," Aqua concluded, "I thought I heard something in the background again, so I tried to spoof him with his wife entering. Turned out that it was closer to reality than I expected…"

'As much as I hate to admit it, that was an extremely elaborate plan, even by normal standards…'

"…Can I ask you a question, Aqua?"

"Huh? What is it?"

"You said something about not having experience because you're from heaven," Kazuma questioned, "Does that mean you don't actually have a body?"

Aqua blushed, "I do now, but in heaven, no. That is merely the image you mortals just perceive us as… why do you ask?"

"…Heh," Kazuma chuckled, "That sort of explains the banana route. Still find it hard to believe that even the gods have no experience…"

"Quiet you!" Aqua returned sharply, pointing a finger on his forehead, "At least I didn't die as some virgin shut-in unlike you, things be damned!"

"Yet the said virgin still knows better than to use bananas as placeholders…"

"Well, that's because you're a guy after all! Of course you knew!"

"Ok then," Kazuma questioned, gesturing a hole with his finger in it, "What is this called, then?"

"…"

"Hah! Even I knew that, and that was female terminology!"

"Hmmph…"

"Chin up Aqua, I was just trying to tease ya," Kazuma chuckled in a mix of sincerity and trying to cheer his compatriot up, "That was a pretty elaborate plan, and for all intents and purposes, the piece of lard deserved that…"

"You bet your bottom-fricken dollar he did!" Aqua jumped back up, her usual spunk returning in full swing, "He should be grateful that a goddess like me would let him off so easily!"

'There it comes with her arrogance again…'

"Hey Kazuma, want to take the plan a bit further?" Aqua questioned, producing a key, "I managed to nab this when he was off drinking again the other day…"

"What's it for?"

"The food storage,"

"Oh, it's on!" Kazuma chuckled.

'So even Aqua has her witty streaks, hopefully it persists for when we need it…'

(the next day)

"I hope we got all of the boxes," Kazuma exhaled, setting down one of the boxes next to the front desk, "Now where is Wiz…"

As per Darkness' suggestion, Kazuma decided to take their group for a visit with Wiz. One reason was to sell the various items they acquired to help pay off debt, while another reason was to see if she had any jobs/opportunities that would pay for them. Main reason was her contacts with the National Party, one of the most powerful third parties in the ongoing civil war.

After maybe fifteen minutes of waiting later, the ever familiar woman emerged from the door behind the counter, "Ah, Kazuma! Good to see you again!"

"Hello Wiz," Kazuma greeted casually, "We're just seeing if we can sell some things here."

"Those?" Wiz pointed at the boxes and wooden rifle stacked together, to which Kazuma nodded, "Of course, I'll take care of those,"

"Thanks…" Kazuma smiled, "I was also going to ask for something else, if you don't mind…"

"Oh? What is that?"

Kazuma explained their financial situation to Wiz, and how they were looking for potential work to help them get out of their predicament. Wiz nodded in understanding, leading the group to a table in a corner of the store they didn't explore properly yet before producing a pan of Buchteln and some cups of tea for them.

"Huh? What's this for?" Darkness and Kazuma perplexed.

"Oh, it's a new business model," Wiz explained, "I figured out if the customers feel more relaxed and at home, they would be more tempted to buy things from the store, and return more frequently."

'In a weapons store, out of all places?'

"…And how much are you charging these for?" Kazuma questioned.

"Free tea, and 10Ks for the Buchteln"

Kazuma choked on his own spit for a moment. That was literally half the price of a regular bread loaf at the 11-mart…

"Is something wrong?" Wiz asked with concern, "Because you guys don't have to pay. It's on the house for your efforts and being my friends…"

"No, it's fine…" Kazuma waved off, "What about that 'solution to our debt' thing?"

"Oh, that!" Wiz lit up again, seemingly remembering her previous task, "Give me a moment…"

'So this is what those free toaster offers actually look like…'

Kazuma idly took a portion of the peach Buchteln, along with his other team members. It was easily better than the cafeteria stuff by a mile and it was being sold for a fraction of regular store bread. It almost reminded him of the food court at a Costco he once visited back in Japan, yet she does not appear to be selling nearly enough guns to have a meaningful return on the incentive she's providing. Not that Aqua seemed to care anyways, as long as she had her share of dessert…

"Kazuma? Can you come over here?" Wiz now called from the front counter.

"Alright,"

….

Wiz had led Kazuma into the back room behind the front desk, and down a flight of stairs at the end of the shelves. There they entered an open area, of what Kazuma guessed to be some form of a conference room, complete with a furnished table, television and a computer.

"Please, take a seat," Wiz gestured, pulling out a chair.

"Why are we down here?" Kazuma questioned.

"It's the conference room," Wiz elaborated, "It's the secret place where we discuss our plans."

'Not so secret anymore, actually…'

"We?" Kazuma asked.

"Ah, there's usually more people around when we use this room," Wiz stated, "Actually, I think Chris may still be around… Chris?"

'Chris? That almost sounded western, and even normal, perhaps…'

"Right… here!" a new voice proclaimed. Kazuma turned around and found himself face to face with another individual, almost causing him to fall out of his seat.

"Gah! Where did you come from?"

Upon closer inspection, he noted that 'Chris' was a silvery haired girl wearing a green camouflage hoodie and black handkerchief lowered around her neck. He was a bit disappointed, as he was both expecting a man and something more 'Western'…

"I just came down the stairs," Chris chuckled, "betcha didn't hear that one coming, did you?"

Kazuma shook his head. Chris smiled.

"Looks like my skills are still sharp then," she said, extending a hand, "As the boss lady said, my name is Chris. I'm something of a saboteur, with specialization in stealth, as you just saw back there."

'This one actually looks competent… why are my party members not like this?' Kazuma thought, shaking her hand. Darkness actually filled that role partially, if it wasn't for her excessive outbursts of masochism…

"It's good to meet you,"

"Likewise," she returned, before focusing towards Wiz, "Either way, you called me?"

"Ah yes," Wiz nodded, bringing out a folder, "My friend Kazuma here was looking for a job, and I was thinking of having him join up with you on the upcoming raid."

"Raid?" Kazuma questioned with some concern, but still maintaining composture. The last action put their lives on the line for a load of debt…

"Ah, I wouldn't mind him tagging along for that raid," Chris reaffirmed to Wiz, "Stuff like that should be easy sauce under my lead."

'What a confident leader,'

"Great!" Wiz beamed, clapping her hands, "I'll be getting back to my shop now."

"Right, now back to business," Chris stated, opening the folder and singling out some photographs, "Take a look at this."

"What is that?" Kazuma asked, perplexed. It looked like a normal coffee shop, or something innocuous…

"It's the Succubus Café, located in Berezino," Chris elaborated, "Looks like a normal coffee shop or something on the outside, yet hosts a variety of… services to satisfy their customers in other ways as well, if you get what I mean, hehe…"

Kazuma tensed. Apart from the innuendo, Berezino was deep inside hostile territory, after all.

"Recently a high profile chedaki individual called 'Beldia' was reported to go there frequently with his men," Chris continued, switching to another photograph showing men moving crates and a field radio outside the compound, "Big boss suspects that the stud has decided to set up a base or something over there, and wants us to raid the compound for anything of value."

"Big boss?"

"His name is actually Vanir, and he's the backbone of our intelligence board," she explained, bringing up an image on her smartphone, "Wears the mask to contain his handsomeness, but is otherwise known for his 'trade deal offers' around here."

Kazuma raised an eyebrow at this, "What type?"

"Well, what do you want it to be?" Chris stated, scratching her cheek idly, "There are many things in this world, after all."

"So something like a drug dealer?"

"I mean, unless you want illegal items, then sure," the girl shrugged, "Although it's not unknown for him to be selling things like Pokémon cards, or even sardine tins for that matter…"

"I see," Kazuma nodded in comprehension, and deciding to switch the topic, "So what's in it for us then, if we decide to participate in this raid?"

"Enough for you to buy out the local bar, if you're up to caliber," she chuckled, patting Kazuma on the shoulder, "But seriously speaking, I think you'll be looking at around 300,000Ks for doing a decent job, with room for extras if you do better. Big boss is quite fair on his payouts, despite his trollish tendencies…"

Kazuma bit his lip at this. It was risky, without a doubt. Yet this was probably the fastest way for his team to claw out of their debt pit, along with the possibility of securing powerful allies should their situation deteriorate.

"Very well, I'll do it," Kazuma affirmed, "I'll talk with my team to see if anyone wants to join in."

"Good, I can see that you're into it!" Chris smiled, giving the boy a thumbs up, "I'll see you guys around for the raid, and feel free to drop by the dock or something if you want to hang out!"

"Sure thing," Kazuma smiled.

'Faith in humanity restored, now we just need more of her in this world…'

….

Back at the store front, Kazuma noted Wiz taking a stack of bills before walking away from the doorway, and his group waving her off. When he emerged from the doorway he noticed Megumin carrying what appeared to be an oversized revolver with a stock.

"Kazuma, check this out!" Megumin stated excitedly, "It's like Chunchunmaru, except it holds six explosions at a time!"

'Not again…'

Kazuma's eye twitched, "Guys, how much did that cost…?"

"Oh, that thing?" Aqua waved dismissively, "It just costed those grenades, the old rifle Darkness got, along with 44,000Ks"

"…"

'Along with additional debt, we have to deal with more explosions as well…'

"Don't be so down Kazuma, that job opening is still up!" Darkness nudged, bringing back the stitched up 'Escorts Wanted' ad Kazuma ripped up previously.

"NO"

* * *

Reinforcements:

Chris (AS Val)*

Items Acquired:

1x MGL

60x 40mm M433 Grenades

Items Lost:

3x Crate

48x RGD-5 Grenade (unfused)

48x RGD-5 Grenade fuses

1x G43 (Zf 41)

43,550Ks

(break)

**Technical Components (Denoted with *, Can be skipped)**

**Hindenburg on a good day- See Hindenburg disaster**

**Opening the trunk- The Skoda 120/L is rear engined, with the engine found in the trunk. Storage space is behind the back seats, with spare tyre in the front.**

**Carburetor- It is a device that pre-mixes a fuel/air mixture before sending it into the cylinders for combustion (Induced by a lower pressure from the throttle valve). Replaced by Electronic Fuel Injection as they are more precise with their mixing, leading to higher fuel efficiency.**

**Chris (AS Val)- A quick way of denoting a character and their primary weapon in the story, when they join Kazuma as an ally.**

**….**

**Other Notes: Not too much to say here, other than more characters have been added to the fray (And tweaked a bit for the different universe). I do plan to add more down the line (Yunyun and Alderp almost certainly).**

**Also with regards to Vanir, I do have plans down the line for him; he's going to have a more neutral stance throughout the story, when compared to the original universe.**

**Once again, please review!**


End file.
